The Scion of Athena
by Arthur Hansen
Summary: Here starts the journey of a girl to goddess among a band of Scions! Special thanks to Don "Dolph", Erin "Janeka", Gabi "Dana" and Trent "Tsukyo" for allowing me to use versions of their characters for this story.
1. In the Beginning

**Chapter 1: In the Beginning**

The young girl woke at the buzzing of the alarm clock as sunlight started to seep through the curtains in her room. She was still adjusting to the new house here in San Francisco. Running a brush through her blonde hair quickly, she walked down the stairs to the main kitchen of the house. At eleven years old, she was nearly a giant (beanpole) at five foot six inches.

A pretty woman of about thirty years was filling her glass with orange juice. "Sheila. Your physical trainer is ready for your morning jog." Lisa Henderson was a no-nonsense woman with darker hair, pale skin and a beauty mark on her left cheek. She was already dressed in a business suit for her day at the office.

"Yes, mother." Sheila noted that her younger brother was not up, though her father was probably in his office working on an affidavit for his law firm.

"You have orientation on Monday at the University. Your home work is on the counter and I expect you to finish up with a perfect grade. Miss Marples will be helping you after your run. Tell Anton that his own work is to be done before he leaves the house."

Sheila ate a heavy breakfast and was outside where her physical trainer was waiting in his own jogging outfit. This was a new trainer, as they had only been living in Berkeley for the last three weeks. Supposedly it was so she could go to the University of Berkeley, but that was something that her younger brother had been more interested in than herself. She was partially through her college education already.

The big, ex-marine named Philip Pollis started them off and kept a strict pace. The next hour passed in a blur as she struggled to work through a knotty problem in her advanced calculas while exercising. She waved her trainer goodbye and entered the back door.

"There you are, Sheila," her younger brother called out. He had dark, curly hair like his father. At ten years old, he was a good fives inches shorter than her. His dark eyes studied her sweat drenched form. "I'm glad I don't have to train as much as you do."

"No, you only have a half an hour jog." She drank a large glass of water when she heard a clicking at the porch door only five feet away. Hanging on the door handle was a very large, spotted owl. She spared her brother an incredulous look, but he was just as surprised as she. Tied it its leg was a thick and heavy package by leather straps.

"Someone must have decided that the Post Office wasn't good enough for their letter," Anton said snidely. "Harry Potter fan much?"

Carefully sliding opening the glass door she slipped the package from the leather straps. Once it was free, the owl flapped off, as if to say 'good riddance'. Her first name was written on the package in perfect calligraphic script. It was a solid package, covered in a heavy burlap. A kitchen knife soon had the thread holding it closed snipped, revealing a carved, wooden box with iconigraphs from ancient Greece upon showing a young girl with short blonde hair being gifted with two items by a woman with a helmet.

"Curiouser and curiouser," the young blonde girl said as she worked the cunning metal latch and opened the box. She picked up the enveloped of vellum and lifted it off the top, revealing a heavy hand pistol and a owl necklace of gold and silver, with amethyst eyes. "A gun? I suppose that could explain why it wasn't shipped through the Post Office."

"I don't recognize the make," Anton declared with the finality of a Call to Duty expert in weapons. "Fancy though."

"I've been invited to _The Garden Court_ to learn of my past and my future. Reservations are for tonight, semi-formal dress is requested." Sheila was really looked at this strangely, as she had only only been to two formal dinners with her parents as part of their religious duties. For some reason, she was educated on the Hellenic Polytheistic Reconstructionist that her parents were part of, but had not actually joined them in many of their practices. Though there had been cryptic mentions that they had been members longer than that movement.

The door to the kitchen swung up. Miss Marples walked in. "Are you ready for your morning, Miss Henderson?"

"Sure."

The next two four hours were quite surprising, as Sheila easily blew through a weeks worth of homework in only a few hours. The concepts suddenly seemed simple and incredibly easy to grasp.

* * *

><p>The tall and lanky form of the eleven year old nodded to the waiter that guided her back to a private room that could easily sit six. She had the carved, wooden box that she had been sent to her. She looked quite willowy and thin in her white dress with a blue-patterned edging, that had a fair resemblance to an ancient toga. The complicated, strapped sandals on her feet only extended that look. This was all something that her mother Lisa had insisted on quite strictly.<p>

Across the table sat a woman with dark brown hair in ringlets and was wearing a very expensive, female Armani suit. Gray eyes studied her through a pair of designer glasses. "Sheila."

She nodded her head. "Hello. I take it you were the one that invited me here?"

"Yes, but first, let us sup."

A six course supper was brought in, fine of quality that lent an air of sophistication to the meal. Sheila fell into the older style mode like at the formal dinners that her parents sometimes had when they entertained important guests. Finally, after a dessert of chocolate cheesecake, the woman spoke.

"There are some very important matters that are coming to a head. I had planned to visit you in a few short years, but time has become of the essence. Great powers are on moving and and I can no longer wait." With a wave, the mystery woman made a crystal ball appear in front of her on the table.

The hackles on the back of Sheila's neck were standing up as she realized that it had no shadow and did not roll off the table. "What is that?"

Images appeared in the crystal ball. Ghosts, then one-eyed giants and a man that threw lightning.

"The gods and titans are moving. You are the daughter of a goddess, not Erwin and Lisa Henderson. Not yet a demigoddess, you only are at the potential of a heroine. You have been gifted with relics and set upon a destiny that is fraught with fate and misfortune. Do not ask who I am, for names have power. If you are as smart and quick of wit... you should have already guessed my identity," the gray-eyed woman said.

She tapped the wooden box, "You should keep your eyes and ears open for old things, as they have more power than you would believe. The relics within are gifts for you to use wisely." She suddenly looked to the door, drawing Sheila's attention there and away from herself.

By the time the young girl looked back, she found herself alone. If not for the empty plate on the far side, she would have thought that this was nothing but a strange dream.

"But what am I supposed to do?" she asked herself as she picked up her box with its items. She opened it again and took out the necklace, feeling it almost burn although it was definitely cool to the touch. She set it around her neck and clipped its sturdy little clasp. With that, she left to take a taxi back to her home.

* * *

><p>Later that night Sheila had stared at her ceiling for hours, trying to figure out what was going on. So it was a jarring surprise when her alarm woke her up at dawn as a light drizzle was falling. It had not been a good night of sleep. Muzzily crawling out of bed and hitting the large button on her alarm clock, she headed to the bathroom.<p>

The new door could stick and she tugged on it hard in a pique of frustration. The crack of snapping wood finished waking her up, as the door was ripped half off its top hinge. Still holding it by the door knob, she swung it around cautiously. It felt like she was waving a piece of cardboard, not a heavy door.

"Empirical evidence suggests that _she_ was not just being insane last night." The young blonde set the door to the side.

Twenty minutes later, she was downstairs grabbing a quick bite to eat. It was Sunday, so the trainer had the day off. So only a light jog around the block and then back. She could feel the difference in speed as she started to run. She had been fairly fast before, if not breaking any records. Now she was easily a third faster than before.

She took a break in the shadows of the sunrise over by Galileo Academy of Science and Technology; her new school tomorrow. No one was about, so she set herself to time her running using the clock on her smart phone. At zero, she was off like the dasher she was, arms pumping rhythmically and with power. She was already certain that she was faster than before, but the young girl had been raised to always compete. With herself, her trainers and anyone.

Unknowingly, she tapped into her wellspring of divinity, her ichor; legend that flowed through her veins as she suddenly accelerated. She could feel the wind whipping through her short hair as she lapped the track in less than thirty seconds. With a burst of adrenaline, she took three loping steps and then leaped _over_ the football field goal.

In a panic, she realized she had overshot greatly and landed on the roof of the school.

"Okay. That was cool." That had been exciting in a way nothing in her life had been before this.

* * *

><p>Monday morning found Sheila running through her normal routine. A heavy exercise regime before seven o'clock and then studying Latin, Greek, ancient history and comparative religion until noon. Somehow, though, in just one weekend her ability to understand and retain information had increased radically.<p>

"That's quite an improvement, Miss Henderson. Your retention has improved quite nicely and you are not struggling with the advanced concepts," Miss Marples said primly. While she was only forty, she seemed bound and determined to act older and more proper. "I'm sure your parents will be quite pleased when I inform them later."

"Of course, Miss Marples." Sheila finished up her home work and then pulled up her phone to start some research while waiting for lunch. Deft fingers set up a very advanced search into old antiquities.

A Professor Stanton was going to be unveiling several artifacts shortly at the University of Berkley from his dig in South America. He was going to be displaying them and the information about their complexity and design, which he was quoted as being 'ground breaking' in the article.

It wasn't until Friday, so she had some time to work on other angles. Like this mysterious vigilante in the Tenderloin who eye witnesses stated had leaped forty feet to escape a police dragnet.

Could this person be like her? Or was it something else?

* * *

><p>The twenty-two year old woman parked her car in front of a random apartment complex, just off the road and so not too visible. She was wearing black clothing that tended to 'lots of pockets' along with an equipment belt that had a knife on it. Her dark hair was smoothed back and she was currently wearing sunglasses.<p>

The area was riddled with five to twenty story tall apartments and tenements. Occasionally you could see a street walker trying to turn some tricks along side young teens that were probably in gangs and peddling various narcotics. Their phones would go off and they'd fade into the shadows just before a cop car could turn the corner.

The young policewoman bit back a snarl, even as she followed a group of peddlers deeper into the alleys.

"Jake, are you sure your friend is going to meet us? And he's willing to fix my busted Buick?" the leader of this group said.

"Yeah, he's good for it. Not part of Vinnie's chop shop, but does irregular work. As long as you pay him in something he can trade, he's good. Just don't get on his bad side. Bastard's big and tough and scary as all hell," the skinny black gang member said to his friend.

"What's his name?" the third member of the gang asked as he fiddled with his gold chains.

"Dolph. Big, big (did I mention big) white guy. Looks like he could eat a Tongan for breakfast, man. He just got suspended from his high school because he put one of the centers in the hospital with a broken shoulder."

They had been walking through several alleys until they got to a small, dingy field between two apartments. Several dead cars were on cinderblocks and there was a man at the end with a large tool box.

"Yo, Dolph! Good to see you, man!"

The big, scary teen nodded. "Marcus, right? You hooked me up with some custom rims a week ago."

Marcus nodded, flashing a gang sign to look wicked. "That's me, man. Da bomb. No problem with them? Or trying to sell them?"

"Nah, they're for my ride." He gave them a smile, but on his face it was more scary that endearing. There was nothing malformed, but somehow all the pieces that melded together formed something just on the bare edge of nightmares. He was huge, somehow looking even bigger than his six foot seven inches. His pale straw hair was jagged and unkempt. "Can we hurry this up? I've got some things to deal with at home." Like beating up his deadbeat father for keeping secrets.

"No problem. But did you know you have an admirer?" Marcus asked as he pulled out a pistol and pointed it at a partially hidden form in a shadow. "Whatcha doing there, you skinny white girl?"

"I was just trying to wait until you left," Sheila said as she stepped out of the shadows of the apartment building. She was already planning on leaping to a balcony thirty feet over her head, then to a different roof if this looked to turn worse.

"Gotta pay up, girl. And if you don't have any money, we get to beat you up." The multi-ethnic gang leader frowned as he studied her. "You got a pretty enough face, you make nice with me and I won't even charge you."

Another shadow was drifting much closer, unnoticed by everyone.

"Hey, she's just a kid," Dolph called out. "Let her beat pavement."

Marcus suddenly had the gun pointed at the big, white Caucasian. "I've got the gun, mutherfucker. That means I tell you what to do, not the other way around. White faggots think you can tell me what to do-"

Dolph looked ready to rip his head off with his bare hands. "You really don't want to make me angry, asshole."

A glint of silver flashed from a shadow and Marcus dropped his bloodied gun with a curse. "I'm gunna fuck you up!" he shouted at the darkness.

The big white-blond had enough of this and took action to reach out and pick up the six foot three Marcus right off the ground like he was only a fifty pound weakling... then head-butted him with enough force to crush his cheek-bone. "Racist bastard! Not so bold without your toy, are you?"

The figure that glided out of the darkness was covered in a Stygian darkness, marred only by a wicked looking silver and curved sickle in her hand. Her combat boot (size 9) smashed into thug #2 with a powerful kick, knocking him back an impressive fifteen feet.

"You know, I was only looking for one super-strong person, not two," the youngest person present said as she tackled the third thug in one low, twenty foot leap. She had her eyebrows scrunched in thought as she tried to determine what these strange, ephemeral scents and echoes of sound were almost telling her.

"You were looking for me?" Dolph asked in surprise.

"Actually, I think I was looking for her. If she's the vigilante that's been putting gang members in the hospital." Sheila had her thug in a full-Nelson to knock him out. "I guess you were just a bonus."

The big Aesir shrugged as he dropped the unconscious form of Marcus on the ground. "These punks were just pissing me off, don't really care about them otherwise."

The shadowy figure had finished knocking out the last member. She was staring at them through a darkness that veiled her face better than any mask could hope to do. "So you found me. As you aren't a cop, I assume you might have a _special_ parent."

"Yeah, got an unwelcome greeting from my old woman. Found out she rules Hel. Literally. How about you two?" the big white guy asked.

"I was told not to use names, but I think there was this little famous city in Greece that's named for her," Sheila said as she studied the other woman. "Which hell, if you don't mind me asking?"

"Helheim. Wonder why she didn't say that to me?" he mused aloud.

Dana nodded finally. "My mother said something similar, though her symbol is similar to my sickle," she said as she reflected a bit of moonlight off of it. "I think that means we might be cousins."

"Greek? Interesting. I'm Sheila. I assume that wearing a mask means you don't want me to know who you are right now. Did they tell you that something big is coming up?"

"My mother did. Her brother had informed her of some scattered prophecies. Some monster is going to get loose and cause a lot of problems. And we were needed here." Dana quickly searched the thugs, divesting them of their loose cash. As far as she was concerned, they were donating to a just cause.

"Any leads on your side?" the youngest Scion asked.

"No. This is just personal," the Daughter of Artemis stated. "How about you, big guy?"

He almost smiled, which looked fairly horrible. "Nah. I mean, she just showed up last night and gave me my spear." He reached into the back of his car and pulled out an ornate spear of black iron, covered in Norse runes. "I haven't even figured out much other than I can see ghosts and I can bench-press a car."

"I've been visited for about three weeks. Which makes this," Dana said while gesturing at the crumpled form of the gang members, "much easier."

"I might have a lead," Sheila admitted finally. "A professor dug up something odd in South America and is going to display it. I think mother hinted that this might be an old thing with more power than we'd expect."

"Another relic? Like my _Artemis's Gleaming Moonsilver_," the daughter of Artemis said as she gestured with the silver sickle.

"It's this Friday. I'm trying to get an invitation. It's semi-formal, as it's catered. It's at the Pheobe A. Hearst Museum," Sheila explained.

"Sounds good to me. I'm not exactly looking forward to the world ending. Got my stuff in it," Dolph said with a truly frightening grin on his face. His laugh came across nastily, though it appeared he really didn't mean any harm in it.

"This Friday then. Let me give you my cell phone number," Sheila said as she reached into her pocket for her smart phone.

They both nodded at that.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 2: Meeting More Allies<strong>

Janeka Sophia White was fairly bored as she drove her rental car down the bustling roads of San Francisco. "Did you get your collar covered up, Tsukyo?" she asked her half-Japanese companion.

The young, sixteen year old teen grimaced, but nodded. "Yeah." He was not going to give up his collar, even if it looked slightly like something out of a bondage movie. "This is the place that your contacts in New York turned up?"

The almost obsidian-black eighteen year old nodded. "Don't feel right not being in my hoodie, but you can't go to this sort of event dress like that even if you do have more money than God."

The pair had met up about three weeks ago when dealing with some shadow ninja that were stealing artifacts from a warehouse. That had been a rather exciting event for her. The man that had visited her with almost buglike eyes had told her about her father

"Here we are. One museum for some 'awesome' unveiling," the young black woman said as she pulled into the parking lot across the street. She tugged her men's suit-coat into place as she stood up.

Tsukyo actually had cleaned up remarkably well. His thin, toned body and features made him look exotic; like some sort of budding model or actor.

Janeka's money had procured her an invitation, which let them past the rent-a-cops easily. A mini-lecture hall had been set up with tables near the front where Professor Stanton was shaking hands. But it was a thin, young girl that was ripping into another professor that caught their attention with the scene she was creating.

"-and using _The Arts of Pompeii_ as a reference for your theory when Hamilton merely mentioned the possibility of Indo-European burial rites just shows your theory is looking for facts to fit it and not facts looking for explanation," Sheila was saying in a cold, hard tone. Call her a blonde bimbo? She would show him. "Your facts are tenuous, your theories are far-fetched and lacking of detail and veracity. I think that hardly anyone could take your theories seriously considering the lack of thought and work involved in them."

Professor Emil Hoone's face was going turgid as his dissertation was shot down in front of his peers. Even worse, she had been amazingly accurate. The young girl in the pale peach blouse and gray slacks had looked too pretty to be this smart so he had targeted her in his misanthropic way. "Why you little-"

"Emil, I think you should take a break before you find yourself in the social column," his old friend quickly interjected.

"Da-amn. I guess she pinned his ears back," Janeka said to Tsukyo in a faux whisper. "Guess she breaks that old stereotype on blondes something fierce." Her shit-eating grin met the startled (then cautious) look in the younger girl that was nearly her height. Dark chocolate eyes studied the girl closely, as she smelled just a hint of metaphorical hot olives upon her. A scion of the Dodekatheon too?

The half-Japanese scion of Susanoo just chuckled at that. "I think they are just about ready to start."

Everyone settled into the rows of seats. The ebon-skinned scion of Ares sat on the same row as the mystery blonde, but a _very_ big white guy sat right next to the girl. Janeka's nose flared as she breathed in the scents of burning amber with just a hint of crackling lightning in the air. An Aesir? Curiouser and curiouser. In the background, Dana stood at the back of the small auditorium.

"Welcome!" Professor Stanton called out from the front of the room as he stood at the podium. "I know you are all curious about why you are here tonight. And no, there are no outlandish theories of aliens here. Just strange artifacts that do not fit any known theory." The balding professor pulled out a little remote control (and laser pointer) and turned on a screen. "This is the first artifact that I dug up at my new sight. Arrowheads, the clutter of history, don't you know." The crowd laughed appreciably at the pun.

Sheila was studying the decayed arrowhead and was frowning. His dig was in Peru, wasn't it?

"This little oddity was found in a quite old layer of sediment and ash that we had stipulated at about five to ten thousand years ago. Previously we had only found crude pottery that fit the ancient Nazca and their predecessors in the area-" the professor was nattering along when the doors slammed open.

Six men in combat fatigues and ski masks spread out, pointing shotguns and handguns at everyone.

"This is a robbery," the leader said in a bored tone as he walked up. As Professor Stanton stepped out from behind the podium, he shot him in the stomach. "No more heroics or we'll start to get... _nasty_."

"Where's the artifacts?" one of the gunmen complained.

Only Dana at the back of the room noted a quick glare from a dark-eyed Greek woman in the corner. But she was distracted by a scream as the wife of an old man clutched at him.

"You said we wouldn't get robbed," she sobbed.

"Shut up!" the leader shouted, turning and pointing the gun.

Silvery moonlight appeared in Dana's hand as she leaped forward, the sickle extending as a whip of cutting, razor metal. Two bullets whizzed past her as the gunman realized someone was actively fighting.

With a scream, almost all the patrons dove between seat.

Dolph, on the other hand, just flung the seat in front of him at the nearest gunmen, sending him staggering from having a metal chair broken on him. "Heh, guess this is that adventure she was promising."

The young half-Asian almost glided across the room and rabbit-punched a surprised bandit in the face. Luckily, he had twin backup as Sheila _and_ Janeka had both pulled out pistols (out of thin air at that) and had started shooting. The booming sound of a .50 caliber hand cannon going off in Sheila's ear was nearly deafening, but the power it packed knocked one of the gunmen over in spite of his bullet-proof armor.

"Scrub this mission! Everyone evac!" the leader shouted.

Pistols and shotguns fired across the short range of the room as everyone fought to control the exits. Sheila suddenly dashed _very_ fast past them in nearly a blur to cut them off. Dolph, on the other hand, simply grabbed one of the big men and tossed him in the way and nearly got shot for his efforts.

"Sorry," the young African-American called out, even as the daughter of Artemis left another slice that stopped one fellow finally.

Tsukyo was finding out that bullet-proof vests worked perfectly fine against fists and was seeing stars from being pistol-whipped by a thug.

The crowd decided to evacuate through the fire exits on the far side of the room, never wondering why the fire alarms did not go off.

The big Aesir did not care as he tried to grapple with the biggest remaining gunman to try and keep him from using his shotgun, but somehow failed to leverage his large strength effectively. The butt of the gun to his face just made him mad though and he decided to forgo grabbing him to just bury his fist in the thugs face.

The boom of Janeka's hand cannon sent the second to the last gunman staggering as he tried to hold in his life's blood through a gaping whole in his chest. Dana slid around behind the two last fighters and then in a flicker of motion, sliced open the last gunmen.

"Damn it," Sheila complained as she moved back around the hallway. "I had thought they had a get away vehicle ready, but I didn't see anything." She had over thought things.

"Well, I think our godly selves should vamoose as soon as we check out those artifacts. Is there a good place to meet around here?" the very young business woman said with a wide grin.

"And the professor!" Sheila was already running.

It was too late for Professor Stanton. The gut wound had been quite fatal, even if he had received prompt attention of a professional with medical equipment. Quickly scoping out the unusual statuette and papers, they followed everyone else out before the police could arrive.

"All this over a statue of a woman?" Tsukyo asked curiously.

"Later, man," the biggest scion called out. "I so don't need this on my records."

* * *

><p>"According to Professor Stanton," Sheila said about two hours later in the back room of a bar that Dolph had nearly grown up in deeper in the Tenderloin area of San Francisco, "this is about ten thousand years old. Which is remarkably impossible."<p>

Tsukyo's gray-blue eyes were focused on the half-naked woman carved out of a hard, white stone. "Why is that? It's just a statue." His physical appearance seemed almost unearthly in beauty, much like Dana and Dolph's looks made them stick out.

"Doesn't look nearly primitive enough," Janeka noted, her average features scrunched in concentration. "I remember reading about some of the oldest sculptures and stuff a few years ago when I was ditching class. Most stuff that is in that age looks much more simple." She was back in her habitual hoodie, emblazoned with 'Frak you!' on the front.

Dolph just shrugged, he seemingly rough hewn features unworried. "Not steel, so not my thing." Behind his hard, blue eyes though he vaguely remembered something similar in his own reading.

"It's almost post-classical Greek in composition, proportions and quality, but way too early. Stanton even had some of the detritus in one of the folds of the wavy clothing dated as closely as he could. It's older than the pyramids," the youngest scion stated as she read the reports.

"It's magical," Dana finally said as she studied it carefully. "I'm not sure what it does, but I think it _might_ be a relic." Like her own mask and sickle that came from her mother. "And its important, something our parents wanted us here and involved." Her touch of the mysteries lent her voice a certain, deep weight of gravitus.

"Well, we have a location in Peru. That's a long flight there. And I think we might want to take some gear while we investigate," the scion of Ares said thoughtfully. Her eyes had noted that neither the large Aesir nor the other two girls seemed to have money. "I can see about hooking us up with a flight down there."

The half-Greek, half-Italian police woman nodded. "I can talk to Samantha about seeing the best way to get us in there. Luckily, their border security is a lot more lax than ours."

"I wonder if I'll be back before my suspension from school is up?" the biggest scion asked as he rubbed the edge of his almost half-formed features. "Eh, not like they even care about me anyways."

Dana just shook her head. "I'm going to be burning through my comp time something horrible. I need to get home, I have my shift soon." With that, she headed out, nodding to the barkeep.

Sheila managed to not blurt out about calling her parents. None of them seemed to have noticed (or cared) that she seemed younger than them all. "I should head out, too." Thank goodness for taxis.

"Come on, Tsukyo. Time to do some research and make some calls."

* * *

><p>Adventure, Sheila thought to herself just three days later, was much more comfortable when read about and not experienced. The flight from Mexico to Peru was in the back of the old propeller-driven plane. It seemed she was not the most robust of the scions here, though that seemed to be the bailiwick of Dolph, Dana and Tsukyo who seemed to not be bothered at all. Even Janeka seemed a bit less bothered than her, though that could have just been a toughness of personality.<p>

The old Lockheed L-188 Electra not really designed as a personnel carrier, but the owner and operator of this particular plane was really not that picky. And Janeka had definitely paid him well enough.

The street-savvy girl that grew up in Harlem was mentally going over her new 'band' of scions like she would any other business or technical problem with the ease of long practice of running her own company.

First you had the huge (and hugely muscled) Dolph Jorgensen. When he had shown up Wednesday looking like some sort of super-model, she had more than taken a double look. Somehow he had the ability to switch between a scarily fearsome horror and amazingly handsome. Probably something he got from his mother, the cold and cruel Queen of Helheim herself, Hel. He was carrying this huge spear, covered in runes. During their trip, he had figured out (with a bit of help from the two resident geeks; Janeka herself and Sheila) that you could hide it within shadows.

Then you had Dana Vitali. Her records were quite clean, but there were some rumors about her mortal family that definitely looked like they needed more investigation. She had a group of actual Amazons, sent to her by her mother. Each of the women looked like they could take just about anyone in their group on. Or at least go down trying.

Tsukyo Roberts was from upstate New York, where he had lived with his mother up until she had died a few years ago. An art major into dance and acting, he was on a scholarship to a major dance school. He had been very good looking before he had been visited by his father. Now it seemed like a ray of sunshine occasionally touched his skin in brilliance.

Lastly, Janeka's current headache. Little miss 'too tall' daughter of Athena. Seemed like an earnest enough kid. And was _eleven_ damned years old. They were about equally fast, but the young blonde daughter of Athena (oh, yay) was actually slightly super-strong. And, she had to grudgingly admit, probably one of the few people that could keep up with her in a purely mental way. Getting some kid that young hurt or killed would have to damn her soul to some special place, as Reverend Samuels for her church back home would always say. He said a lot of things like that.

One of the muscle-bound Amazons sidled through the crates. "Pilot says we should be landing in about ten minutes and that we should tie our stuff down."

"Thanks, Samantha," the black teen replied. She had her cell phone out and was checking with her local contact to make sure their road rangers were ready by the time they landed.

The touchdown at the _Maria Reiche Airport _in the city of Nazca was only a little bumpy. Outside it was pretty cold, as it was in the middle of the winter months.

Janeka sighed as she started to talk rapid fire in Spanish (a heavy Harlem accent) to a fellow that was looking for his bribe to look the _other_ way as they unloaded a whole bunch of crates. In her hoodie that said 'May the Farce be with you!' she looked very American.

Dolph seemed to not even notice it was cold, while Tsukyo and Dana merely seemed to think the cold was an inconvenience, unlike Sheila who was modestly freezing in her light jacket. She noted that Janeka seemed to be in the same boat as her, settling a jacket over her navy blue hoodie. "So the camp site is about a day's drive away?"

Janeka nodded as she took the driver's seat. "But tonight we have some rooms at the hotel at the edge of town."

Nazca seemed like many other South American cities, though for most them this was their first time outside the USA. The hotel was a fairly cheap row hotel. Dolph helped the Amazons load their packs into the rooms, then looked around.

"Well, I'm going to play tourist," the suddenly 'prettified' Aesir said. He looked a bit like a 'more real' Fabio Lanzoni at his prime.

"Sounds fun, man!" the half-Japanese scion said. "Being cooped up in that plane was so boring. I hope they have some sort of dance club or something."

"I'll tag along, if you don't mind guys," Dana said. Her Greek-Italian features actually made her fit in better than either of the two young teens.

"I've got some business stuff to deal with," Janeka admitted as she slipped out a sleek and very expensive notebook computer out. "The business won't run by itself."

The Amazons were busy checking their guns (which included several older M-16s) as they chatted among themselves.

Sheila slipped out, wanting to stretch her legs. It had been a couple of days since her last chance to exercise and she felt so sluggish. The cold left her breath leaving a foggy trail behind her as she ran for a few miles. About a mile and a half mile into her jog, she noticed she had picked up a tail. The somber Peruvian had a pistol under his jacket from the bulge. She stopped at a small cafe, pulling out a handy English to Spanish dictionary and tried to order a pastry. She had been working to learn the language as soon as she had heard where whey were headed.

_"Your papers, please,"_ the stern man in the short cropped hair said as he caught up to her.

Sheila had pocketed her book and in reasonable German, replied with, _"Can I help you?"_ After a he repeated her question, she switched to Greek. _"Hello? Do you speak Greek?"_

"Miss, I know you can speak English," the Peruvian said in an angry tone.

"But you didn't ask me in English," she noted right back. "Is there something I can do to help you?" She tried to project earnest sincerity.

"Yes, you can hand over the artifact, _chica_. Then we don't have to worry about any problems from you Americans," he said with a nasty smile.

"Artifact?" she asked in fake confusion. She was not fooling anyone, as she was no actress.

He pulled out his snub-nosed revolver. "We'll see how you talk after some persuasion." He shouted something in Spanish to the waitress that sent her scurrying back away from the door. "Outside."

She was just walking out when she saw one of Dana's Amazons. She side-stepped out of the way as the blonde warrior woman stepped around the corner and punched the Peruvian gunmen in the face so hard he bounced his head off the side of the door frame.

"Sheesh. Can't keep you out of trouble. The combine said that you heroines could fall into trouble faster than bees to honey," the six foot one woman said. She quickly kicked the man three times. "Let's get out of here. Are you wearing your vest?"

"Yes. I was just getting some air. Someone really wants these relics."

"The gods just tell me what to do and I do it," the Amazon noted.

Upon their return, Janeka was not amused. Was this what her Gramma and Grandpa had gone through with her? "Why me?" she almost mocked herself.

"Fate, right?" Sheila replied cheekily.

"No more of that. You got it?" she warned.

* * *

><p>The scions and Amazons had left very early in the morning, before daylight. The city of Nazca was actually on the southern end of the world famous desert that the Nazca line geoglyphs had made famous. Sheila was in the back in the middle because she was smaller than Tsukyo or the Amazon that was sitting next to the window. There was an e-book in her hands, paging through the Spanish language primer quickly, mouthing words to herself silently.<p>

The blonde Amazon glanced over. "How long have you been studying that?"

"About three days," the girl admitted.

Outside, it was very cold and very still as the two range rovers drove through the darkness, following the map that Janeka and Dana had set up.

Janeka was drinking from her coffee mug, trying to keep awake. "It's quite a drive to an upper plateau."

Dolph, in the passenger front seat that he _barely_ fit in, his knees jammed against the dash, was looking at some satellite photos. "These are really good pictures and only a few days old," he noted.

"A little bird happened to mention that a certain satellite was in position," Janeka said with a wide grin. Her features looked a lot like a younger Whoopi Goldberg.

"That must have been a neat trick to get past the security," Sheila mused as she continued her Spanish lessons.

The African-American snorted. "I wrote some of their best security _before_ dear old dad's myrmidon showed up on my doorstep to drop in and tell me I'm the daughter of a war god. I used to be one of the best. Now I don't know anyone that can keep up with me when I'm doing computers." She down-shifted as she went around the corner on a switchback in the morning gloom.

The big, blonde Aesir nodded. "I was always bigger and stronger than most people. Now I can lift a truck up."

"Eye spy something that starts with an R," Janeka called out as she drove the lead rover.

* * *

><p>The green and brown range rovers were pulled off the side of the cracked, dirt road.<p>

Janeka was studying the camp at the edge of the valley. "That sure doesn't look like no one is there."

Sheila was studying the camp when her vision suddenly zoomed in. "Whoa, that was weird. Instant telescope. I don't quite have the right angle though. The curvature of the plain is blocking some of my view."

The daughter of Artemis raised an eyebrow at that. "I guess I've been focusing a bit too much on my... hunting skills, I guess you could call it." Her nose could track just about anything these days, but her eyes were only very keen. Out of curiosity, she had them tested and had 20/10 vision.

"Yeah, even with my improved peepers and these binoculars, not seeing a lot here," the daughter of Ares said with a shrug.

"Give me a big lift up, Dolph?" the shorter blonde asked him.

"Are you sure?" the big Aesir asked. He was pretty sure he could toss the girl a good fifty yards if he needed to.

She gave him a cute smile, though she had nothing compared to the two men in looks. "Just a toss up."

He gripped his hands into a make-shift stirrup and then helped her leg muscles push her into the sky. Sheila flew through the air easily up to a hundred feet up. She suddenly had a feeling that this was not the bright idea she had thought it was, though she did have a good snap-shot view of the camp and dig. As the ground zoomed towards her (with her stomach left far above) she desperately tried to roll as she hit the ground. Pain shot up her legs and across her shoulder, but she didn't think anything was broken.

"Ow."

Tsukyo and Janeka were over to her first. "You all right?" the dancer asked worriedly.

"Yeah, think I rolled just enough. Twisted my ankle a little bit. Let me mark what I saw on the map. There's a _lot_ of guards though. And they aren't wearing the Peruvian army uniform. I think they are mercenaries."

"Sounds like it's time to plan a battle," the daughter of Ares said with a grin.

* * *

><p>Dana's Amazon were leading the left flank of the attack around a short hill, while Dolph's Einherjar warriors of the dead that he had summoned from the earth itself, were tasked with going right up the center - as they were hard to permanently kill off. That left the rest of the Scions to try to sneak in close and then be heavy hitters when needed. Dana herself stayed roughly near her Amazons just in case of trouble. Gunfire was criss-crossing between the mercenaries and the Scion's band.<p>

Sheila had discovered that her twisted ankle had actually healed up in just three hours. She had her pistol out as she glided along the ground. Dolph was in front, wearing a bulky bullet-proof jacket and Janeka was about thirty feet to her left and they were almost to the main tent when their plans hit a very major snag.

Something huge within the tent stood up and casually used a ten-foot long metal club with square spike to fling the tent away.

"Oh, shit," Dolph said as he suddenly danced backwards to avoid a smashing down-swing that left a three foot crater in the ground.

The nine foot tall Japanese ogre, an Oni, leered at him with a demonic smile and round cheeks. Tsukyo leaped and kicked him, but only bounced off the huge shoulder of green muscles.

"This might be a problem," the Amatsukami scion said as he danced around the two hundred pound metal staff Tetsubo that whizzed through the air.

Janeka's .454 Casull boomed again, actually injuring the Oni as he roared right back at her. He set out at a lumbering run towards the business woman when he finally noticed a heavy rumbling engine sound. With a ba-bump as the heavy and old SUV hit a divot, the scion of Artemis barely corrected just enough to run into the Oni at forty miles an hour.

This actually diverted him from the young black teen, as it appeared the mangled vehicle had annoyed the Japanese ogre. Janeka had kept firing even as Dana dove out of the black SUV. Tsukyo dashed up and punched the ogre, but he just wasn't strong enough to bludgeon such a powerful monster with his bare hands.

"Oh, this really sucks," he complained as he barely dodged the massive iron staff of the monster.

With a roar, Dolph slammed home the spear Hel had given him, opening a large gash with _'The Shovel'_ as he had taken to calling it. "Go down," he shouted.

Sheila had lined up a careful shot and with a much lighter crack, toppled the ogre... much to her surprise. "I think he was almost down," she said very obviously.

"Man, my party is a bunch of kill-stealers," Janeka joked with a huge smile.

"I think we are just about cleaned up here," Dana said carefully. "Wait, someone's getting away."

And indeed, off in the distance, a bare-chested man was running away quickly with a small crate in his hands. He leaped off a small cliff as black, shadowy wings erupted from his back, racing him off into the evening.

"Can anyone chase him?" the scion of Ares called out quickly as she tried to line up a shot with her Casull.

"Sorry, I've only figured out a bit of that sky stuff," Tsukyo said with a nervous twitter.

"I haven't even gotten that far," Sheila admitted. "I'm pretty much only able to diagnose physical ailments right now." She would have to fix that soon.

"Guys, this is weird. Is that a pyramid?" Dana called out as she peeled her shadow-mask from her face. Down in the bottom of the now uncovered pit was the gleaming top of a four-sided structure of the tip of a pyramid.

"What the hell? The Nazca didn't make buildings like that," Janeka said as she dashed up.

"It doesn't look like they've gotten very far. I wish we could tell how important this is," the young scion of Athena groused as she kicked the dirt with her the toes of her hiking boot.

Dolph just shrugged as he set _The Shovel _over his shoulder while Tsukyo looked on quite curiously.

It was the scion of Artemis that spoke finally. "I might be able to tell. Give me a minute to set up an oracle." The Greek-Italian was reaching into a pouch from her bones, another relic from her mother and imbued with the power of prophecy from her uncle Apollo.

Everyone watched her carefully as she rolled the bones on the hard earth. So they all saw the bones seemingly land randomly.

The dark-eyed Dana looked at them all. "This secret here could change the world." In her eyes, the actual word for secret in Greek had been formed by the bones, the word 'μυστικό'.

"Well, I'm all for uncovering secrets, but where?" the big Asgardian asked as he brushed the shoulder-length blond hair out of his face. The cold wind was mussing up the too-perfect hair a bit.

"North side? Astrologically, the great entrances to the pyramids were usually on the side that faced the sun. In Egypt, that was the south side-" Sheila explained her thoughts aloud.

Janeka nodded, her black dreadlocks swaying around. "But here in South America, the sun is on the north side. Makes sense."

"Easy enough to verify. I've been meaning to try this." With that, the big Aesir touched the ornate runic armband on his right bicep, then slammed the butt of _The Shovel _against the ground, feeling the Earth below him with something he had deciphered using a book of runes. "Got it, just like you guessed. It's quite a ways down, though. Are we going to be careful and do this like real archaeologists?" Dolph asked.

"Pretty sure that they were destroying everything in their haste," the son of Susanoo noted. "I bet that guy comes back with some of his buddies. Like those ninja we fought in New York. Right, Janeka?"

She frowned back at him, but nodded. That had been a bit hairy.

"Someone better get a lantern. Sounds like I'll be doing some serious digging," the big Aesir noted aloud.

"Got that covered, big guy," the effeminate half-Japanese stated as he started to glow with the soft brilliance of the sun as he touched the collar on his neck. Specifically the symbols of 太陽.

In fact, it ended up mostly being Dolph, Dana and Tsukyo doing the lion's share of the work. Sheila and Janeka chipped in, but the others were generally stronger and could work for hours without rest. It was in the early morning of the next day that they had dug down over seventy five feet. So they had set up a rope and other lanterns when Tsukyo's glow had faded.

They all shared a look at the massive doors, which had resisted all attempts by even Dolph to pry open. In fact, he had not even chipped the stone, much to his surprise.

"I wonder..." the youngest Scion said. She put her hand up against the doorway. Concentrating heavily, she forced legend and tried to control the doorway, like it was some sort of massive relic. And with that... the stone faded away, leaving open a ten foot tall and six foot wide entrance.

"Nice!" Janeka drawled out.

"I don't recognize these glyphs on the wall at all." Sheila was staring at row upon row of symbols along the top and bottom. The hackles on her neck was creeping up.

Now that everyone else was looking at them, neither could they. It looked like some sort of flowing, script of pictographs; elegant and concise.

"I think we found our Mystery," Dana noted dryly in an oblique tone.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 3: The Impossible Pyramid<strong>

They rested for a few hours, then set the Amazons and the re-exhumed Einherjar to guarding the camp again while they entered the entrance. Sheila was taking pictures with her smart phone every dozen feet or so. When she noticed Tsukyo's questioning glance, she said, "Just getting some research material. I already see some patterns."

Janeka aimed a high powered flashlight around the first anteroom. "Just an empty room, like at Khufu." The darkest-skinned scion shook her head at Sheila grabbing several more pictures of pictographs. She'd have to get a copy for her computer later. "Let's keep going.

Sheila stopped and looked back the way they had come, frowning slightly as she considered distances. She trotted to catch up to Dana, who raised an eyebrow at her. "Just thinking about something."

The corridor angled off to the left and came to another door.

"Ooh! Let me!" Tsukyo called out as he put his hand on the door to channel some legend into it.

This door vanished just as easily as the last one, leading into a circular room. Really, it was more of a vertical forty foot wide shaft that happened to have three foot ledge around most of it. They looked around, but there did not seem to be any other hallways.

"There are hand-holds cut into the shaft," Janeka noted as she tried to look down the shaft where there was a break in the walkway.

"Only a little climbing involved," Dana said with dry wit.

"Up or down?" Dolph asked.

With a flip of a coin, they decided to start climbing down. About two hundred feet down, the came across another tunnel that went off at a different (15 degree) angle, according to the mental map in Sheila's head.

"It looks similar to the tunnel we entered in," Dana called out. Her powers over Darkness allowed her to see in pitch blackness as easily as full daylight, something all the other scions were envying.

"Let's take a look then," the big Aesir said with grin on his face. He was obviously having too much fun at the challenge.

By the first anteroom, the temperature was dropping rapidly. Their breath was misting as they opened the second door to a wall of dark ice.

"I don't think we're equipped for that," the daughter of Artemis said as she tugged on her mask for a little bit more covering.

"I could go myself. For some reason, I'm not feeling this at all. Of course, Helheim is a place of utter cold so that isn't too surprising," the big blond, almost-giant said.

"Let's not pull any Scooby-Do antics and stay together. We can always come back," Janeka decided.

"Scooby-Do? Well, the idea is a good one. Splitting up just means we might get ambushed separately. Unless we are in a dire hurry?" the youngest scion noted aloud while looking slightly confused about the pop-culture reference.

Janeka was giving her an odd, piercing look but did not say anything. Her ears and nose were already freezing cold.

"No, not really," Dana said as she moved to close the door.

"Guess that's okay," the big Asgardian grumbled.

Tsukyo just shook his head at the big guy's antics. "I like the snow, but that looked way too cold for me."

Each tunnel they found at each new level down led to new areas. Next was a jungle up against the mountains, then the middle of a blazingly hot desert as the sun was setting.

"I think that was in Africa," Sheila muttered as she juggled hours and time-zones in her head.

Finally, at the bottom of the shaft (and nearly a thousand feet down) they reached the end. A larger tunnel led off directly to what Sheila was thinking of as 'north' though might not have been. Her ability to keep things in their place around her was taking a beating, as she was _pretty_ sure that Euclidean geometry was being abrogated here in this place.

This did not leave to an anteroom, but a very large room with with an embossed map of the world with various locations laid out. Sheila started taking snapshots with her phone.

"I would just bet that these are all locations that you can travel to with those entrances," Janeka said as she considered things.

"It looks like we probably only saw about half of them. Which means the rest were up. That's a lot of climbing," Sheila said as she considered the matter.

"Why is there so much climbing?" Tsukyo asked the two 'brains' of the group.

Sheila and Janeka shared a quick glance at each other and a shrug.

"It may have to do with keeping the entrances far enough away that they don't interact," the youngest girl noted.

"And there's probably some damn elevator trick we haven't figured out." Janeka's arms were _killing_ her so far. She was not looking forward to climbing back up.

Dana was kneeling over the area in North America that they all lived. "I think there's an exit near our home. I do wonder what the words say."

"Probably what level and who is in the area," Dolph noted casually. "At least that's what I'd put on a map next to a magical means of travelling to them."

"He's got a point," the young half-Japanese said in agreement, leaning his wiry and lithe form against the wall.

The last, larger hallway led to another door, covered in glyphs and figures. There was one other difference, it would not open, no matter how much they tried. In fact, Dolph could not even mar the surface of the strange stone it was made of.

"So I guess we've figured everything we can at this moment," Sheila mused aloud. "I think we need to work at cracking this code."

"And we can do that safely back home. Let's go get your minions-" Janeka said while quirking an eyebrow at Dolph and Dana.

Dana actually glared at the daughter of Ares for a long moment. But she could sense from the younger woman that it was all meant in jest.

"-and head home. I think I'll just pay for the cars as being lost. And we close this door," she explained her plan without pausing.

"Sounds like a plan."

* * *

><p>Dolph jammed <em>The Shovel<em> into the earth in front of his Einherjar. "Return to the earth!" he ordered them in the morning light of the California mountains. His dead father, Sigurd Jorgensen, just glared at him as he was returned to Hel's halls. The other Einherjar left almost as reluctantly; they were a motley group that included a Teutonic knight, an ancient viking, a WWI airplane pilot and a SS officer that just glared at Janeka and Tsukyo spitefully.

"That's some messed up shit you have there, man," Janeka said bluntly. "GPS has our location nailed down though. We're in the mountains to the east by south-east of the San Francisco bay. Just above the Burnt Hills. Not much up here normally. Which I bet is why this place has never been seen."

"I see a hiker's trail, way down there. I'm more wondering how we are going to get down from this cut off ledge," the daughter of Artemis said, shading her dark eyes as she looked down the mountain.

Even Dana's Amazons looked a little disconcerted at the sheer cliff face.

Sheila's eyes were taking in everything, placing in its normal, 3D space location. "Actually, I think we can climb up there and then the path leads back down." She crouched down and then leaped forty feet straight up and twenty feet over.

"She's a regular jumping bean. Damn it, my arms are going to fall off at this rate," Janeka complained.

There was a path that was quite hidden, in fact Dolph, Tsukyo and the Amazons could not even see it at times. Only the three female scions could. Eventually they discovered that each had 'super' senses of some sort. Dana was nearly a blood-hound in tracking ability, Janeka was able to adjust her senses to infrared and such while Sheila had her telescopic senses.

It was mid-afternoon by the time they were in a van that Janeka had hired.

"I'm thinking I'll buy a cabin as near as I can get to there for a base camp. That way its easier for us to get around," the scion with the most money explained.

"Not a bad idea. I really want to explore more of that later." That had been quite exciting to the Aesir.

* * *

><p>Sheila waved to others at the sidewalk as the van drove off. She walked up to the door and let herself in. The sounds of loud mayhem from the flatscreen TV was quite telling. "So that's homework, huh?"<p>

Anton just about jumped out of his skin. He quickly adjusted to her presence. "Oh, hi Sheila. Back already?"

"That's right. Mother and Father are out, right? Then I should be able to shower and clean up."

She went through the four days of accumulated 'special' homework for Miss Marples and additional Spanish learning before she heard the sound of her (step?)father in the early evening. She closed up her computer notebook on her desk and slipped her e-reader into a pouch on her shorts. Then she walked down to the front room where Anton and her father were talking over his piles of homework.

"Ah, Sheila. Anton was saying you were home," Erwin said as he loosened his tie slightly. "Your back early from your adventure." Tall, dark and handsome were quite applicable to the nationally famous lawyer.

"You are really taking this whole thing rather well," she said, fishing for information.

"We were told about your mother when she brought you to us. In fact, she demanded that we raise you exactly as we have. Of course, you are supposed to have seven more years of getting ready. But not even a goddess can foresee everything. I'm not sure why she wanted you to join the navy. Nostalgia, perhaps." Erwin's voice was classically controlled and mellow as always.

"What are you talking about, dad?" Anton asked from where he was sitting on the couch.

"Sheila's... mother, that asked us to care for her as her foster parents. She is quite exacting on what she wanted. In repayment, she blessed our family greatly, as only the most powerful of goddesses can," the Sicilian said with a wide smile to his son.

"Dad... you aren't making a lot of sense," the ten year old said in confusion. "I thought Sheila was doing something for you?"

"No, she was doing the bidding of Wise Athena herself. Which reminds me, there are some ceremonies that we should make sure to enact," Erwin mused idly.

Sheila glared a bit. "She never mentioned her name, saying that they had a power in them. And you never wanted to include me before." In fact, she had wondered quite a bit why she had not been dragged to the different feasts at times.

"It would not have been exactly appropriate. In fact, the power of names might have been part of it. I'll have to think on that a bit." Erwin looked over at the click of the front door. "Ah, the love of my life!" He smiled grandly at his wife.

"A family pow-wow and I wasn't invited?" the thirty-six year old woman said with mock anger. She kissed her husband and then fussed with Anton's hair. "So what are we all gathered around for?"

Sheila's face was quite flat. "We were just discussing my differences. I'm going out." Again she was excluded.

"What is she talking about? Why is everyone making a fuss about her?" the ten-year old whined.

The young scion wheeled on him, tears in her eyes. "Isn't it obvious. I'm not your sister, I'm just a chore to be handed off because my real mother is too busy!"

"Sheila!" Lisa shouted in shock.

The young scion kicked through the wooden front door, sending shards of wood skidding down the sidewalk. It quite startled an old black man as the girl leaped the fence in a single bound and then started running down the street to try and outpace her tears.

Desperate anger at her parents that always had time to hug her brother fueled her desire... no her _wish_ to go faster, to get away from her house. The ichor of the gods, her birthright answered as the world seemed to slow down around her as she sped past cars on the busy roads of San Francisco at such a pace that she was nearly just a blur of motion down Broad Street.

She happened to be heading east, so when she came to the end of the street, she cornered around a restaurant and then the to the bay, she took several steps on the edge of the water to get ready to leap and swim across when she realized she was moving so fast that the water was nearly solid. Even with her uncanny speed and physical deftness, she still nearly stumbled.

Narrowing her blue-green eyes, she got back into the rhythm, not realizing quite what a spectacle a running person at nearly a hundred and fifty miles per hour would make as a spray of water was left in her wake. It only took her just over ninety seconds to cross the bay and leap back up to the street level, leaving behind only a few people fast enough to try and snap a picture on their phones.

Finally a destination had occurred to her confused, angered mind. Snapshots of the trip in her perfect memory led her back down the freeways, then highways and side roads... and then finally off road and up a very hidden path.

Chest heaving from the exertion, she slumped against the closed doorway to the strange pyramid complex. "That was stupid," she said to no one in particular. She slammed a small fist against the ground, wincing at the pain. "But I guess I should have figured out a long time ago that I was not really their child."

She looked little like them, as they were all dark-haired and tanned quite easily. They were strict with Anton Pells Henderson, but did actually treat him more like a child. He had his friends and went to a private school. And they always had time for his recitals and to talk to his teachers in praise. He was their wonder child, even when he was years and years behind her in schooling.

But she had been mostly kept at their home, with private tutors that drilled her hard with only Sunday being a 'light study' day. The young girl had been allowed to pass her high school exams a year ago and had started to go to school at the University of Chicago.

But when _Anton_ had evinced an interest in going to Berkeley, her parents had started the process of moving across country rather abruptly.

She hated them both for not being her real parents.

* * *

><p>"Marcy Cartwright, huh?" Janeka said as she patted her tight braids somewhat dry. Her spider program had finished the <em>mostly<em> legal background check of the different member and left it in her email. Really, the only changes had been a note that Dolph would be allowed back in school on Monday and that Sheila's adoption papers had been found.

Her natural mother had an athletic and pretty woman that had died in childbirth in Chicago. No father was listed, but there was a name that was noted as fake, as no one in Pyrgetou, Greece existed... Oh, one of those.

That was when her phone rang with . "Yo, this is Janeka."

"He-llo," Dana called out as she finished fitting her utility and holster belt on over her uniform. "I just thought I'd let you know I just happened to be listening to the news when I happened to notice something that is probably important. It was kind of odd that it was on the news, but it jumped out at me in importance-"

"Out with it, woman," Janeka said with a laugh and smile on her face.

"Right," Dana said with a roll of her eyes. "There's a new project at the Berkeley Physics department that is just finishing being installed. Strange, high energy physics. Sorry I don't know more."

"It's your supernatural insights that helped us last time. Though I'm not exactly sure what high energy physics has to do with our world now a days." The African-American drummed her fingers on the little work desk next to her computer in the motel room. "Let me call the others and ask around."

It only took a moment to dial the number for the big Asgardian. "This is Dolph," he answered from under his car. He put the phone up to his ear and tried to hold it in place with his shoulder. He then casually held up the car an extra three inches while he tightened a screw on the frame assembly.

"Hey Dolph, this is Janeka. Dana just noted something odd in the news. Something over at the university here. Just really weird, as its in the physics department," the scion of Ares said as she was rapidly researching the project. "Probably ought to check it over the weekend."

"I doubt they are giving public tours, but it might not be a bad idea," he admitted aloud. "I'll talk to you tomorrow in the morning?"

"Sure," Janeka almost chirped out as she continued her online research.

The knock at her motel room door was quite loud and not like Tsukyo at all. The young scion of Ares went over to the door and stood on her tippy toes to peek through the peep hole, her pistol at the ready. "Great." She opened the door to the man standing there.

He was an unusual looking specimen, wearing a tan trenchcoat. "Greetings, daughter of Ares," the Myrmidon said even as he looked up and down the hall. "I have been sent with a missive from Zeus himself." His eyes looked flat, alien and unfriendly and showed his inhuman roots.

"What's my other grampa want?" the ebon-skinned teen asked with narrowed, angry eyes.

"The place... Nazca of Peru... is to be off limits. That past is forbidden knowledge. Thus I have passed the decree to you as dictated," the strangely alien being stated.

"What? Is this some ancient joke that no one wants to be unearthed? Like the goddesses making sure that Ares visited me without knowing I'm a girl?" the heroine demanded.

"No, this is a serious matter of the gods themselves. I have done my duty as I have been specifically dictated to do so," the servant of the god.

Janeka caught the reference and thought about the way she had been told to back off. Stay away from Nazca... but they didn't need to go there to investigate the place, did they? "Someone is tricky, cunning and deceptive... Ares did not send you, did he?"

"I am not allowed to inform you of whose orders I follow. I have to leave now," the being said, his black eyes blinking furiously.

"And that's the answer I was looking for. Thanks Ant-Man." Janeka closed the door, then walked back to her computer as she thought furiously. The King of Gods, Zeus himself, had ordered them away. But the person that delivered the message had twisted the message just enough that they could wiggle into continuing to investigate the abandoned place. "Hermes or Athena?" she wondered aloud. "Got to be Athena, as Hermes would just pop in and deliver the message himself. Which means she's the one behind dear old fucking dad not knowing I'm a boy, too. Bitch."

She tapped away for five minutes on her information gathering requests. (It wasn't hacking, these days. She was a respectable security consultant that even did business to the likes of the NSA and FBI. Nope, not hacking at all. Even if she just bypassed the login security of that server. She would just leave them a patch that fixed their hole.)

The fast patter of knocks on her door heralded the arrival of Tsukyo. As soon as the door was open, he was talking. "My father sent me a message. I mean, there I was, taking a shower when this water lady formed from the water. I was thinking, hey that's pretty cool and all when she started to tell me that I should avoid that secret place we uncovered in South America. Then she offered to spend the night and talk about my father, though I'm not sure how much talking we are-"

"Right, right. I just got told the same thing. Do you know anything about high energy physics? Or why some project at Berkeley _of_ high energy physics is so important?" Janeka said, cutting him off quickly. Tsukyo could be a bit high strung at times.

"Um, no. I'm still in high school on that dance scholarship. Not a lot of sciences there, really," the handsome, younger teen asked. "What are we going to do about the message?"

"Not go back to Peru. It was too cold anyways," the normal, plain looking African-American said with a sloppy grin. "Exactly as they said, eh?"

"Why- Oh, I see. I think."

"Go back and entertain your Nereid friend that your father sent to visit you. I mean, you just left her alone and that might be considered rude, right?" she pointed out to him.

"Oh, right! Well, I'll talk to you later, Janeka!"

Janeka just shook her head as he closed the door behind him to go to his own room. She tapped another number on her phone. "Hey, Sheila. You sound a bit breathless."

"Yeah, I just went for a run after a fight with my family," the girl said as she sat against the door to the strange and hidden complex, high up on the cliffside of the mountain.

"Well, got a few things. You know of anything about a high energy physics project at Berkeley?" Janeka asked.

"I'm sure there are a few, but nothing ground breaking," the younger girl said as she shrugged.

"Huh. Dana said that she spotted something important and that it was a new project. Doesn't sound like you know anything about it either. Well, I think we are going to get a tour of the place tomorrow."

"I really don't remember anything like that when I researched Berkeley a couple of months ago. That's when I decided to continue on my structural engineering degree instead." Sheila was thinking furiously.

"Curious George is me, then," Janeka said as she used one of her Grampa White's favorite sayings without meaning to. "Another thing is that we are getting godly orders to not go back to Nazca and research that pyramid. In such a way that we just happen to be clear to research the actual complex. Just have to void that entrance in Peru."

"I haven't gotten a message like that-! Oh, here comes an owl." Sheila glared as she stood up, untying the envelope from the huge barn owl. "Thanks."

The owl hooted and she could have almost sworn that it had said goodbye. She scanned through the letter that essentially told her to not investigate the ruins they discovered in Peru and that all parties were being warned off. "Yeah, same message. Nothing about this entrance though."

"Methinks someone wants us to research this on the sly," Janeka said. "I wonder if that's like the language of the gods or something? That would be wicked if it was like the source code of reality."

Sheila was frowning. "How come I get the feeling we are being led around by the nose?"

"Considering I think my messenger was actually from your mother... You might be right. So I'll be by tomorrow to pick you up, 'kay?" Janeka disconnected as she started to dig into the mystery more.

* * *

><p>Dolph was still working on his car two hours later. Ever since he had been visited by his mother, he had found he needed little sleep. And his 1969 Ford Mustang was his way of coping with issues that he did not want to deal with; like his father or being suspended from school.<p>

"You going to stay under black and chrome monstrosity all night?" his father's danish-accented voice asked from the entrance to the garage, just like he always did-

The son of Hel slid out quickly and scrambled to his feet. "What the hell are you doing here? What if the neighbors saw you?"

"So? I have got a new shirt to cover the hole your mother made in chest. Other than being pale, they probably wouldn't notice jack and shit unless it was flung in their face." Sigurd sneered at his son that stood at least five inches taller than him already. "The Bitch sent me to deliver a message."

"Great. Even dead I can't get rid of you," Dolph grumbled aloud. "What's the message, father?"

"Stay the _hell_ away from those ruins you found in Peru. Hel didn't like getting a direct order from Odin about it neither. So she took out her frustrations on me and then booted me back to the real word." The emaciated blond may have been handsome at one point, but he had let his body go to waste years ago. "Me, I say tread carefully. I don't think you have to be alive to do her bidding."

"Fine. What about this thing at Berkeley?" he demanded of his father.

"I'm just a messenger. What thing?" the Einherjar asked.

"Nevermind. You got some messages. I think your case worker called." Dolph sent him an evil look. "Of course, I could tell her that you are dead and can't get your check any more."

"Damn, how am I supposed to buy my beer?" the dead Norseman complained.

"You're dead... Actually, that's not much of a reason for us to not drink, is it?" The young Asgardian shook his head. This was taking some adjustment.

* * *

><p>Sheila jogged back down the road just as the sun was setting. The front entrance of her house was boarded up, so she went to the back door. "Hello," she called out<p>

"In here," Erwin called out from his office on the ground floor. He waited until she stuck her head around the corner. "You know that we were instructed not to give casual displays of affection for you?"

"Why not?" she snapped out, her old anger resurfacing.

"I believe it was a form of reinforcement so that you would put 110 % of your effort into your studies. Lisa also thinks it was to make it easier to convince you to join the Navy when you turned seventeen. Whatever it was, it worked better than it ever should have. You can't normally _make_ geniuses, but Athena did with you." The lawyer nodded as he saw her start to think things through. "We do know that you were not supposed to be visited until you turned eighteen at the very earliest. So _something_ is changing. Something urgent enough to disrupt _her_ plan."

"I really don't like being treated like some... experiment," she groused. "But I think I would hate not being what I am though."

"Sheila," Erwin said slowly as he looked out the window. "You need to remember that you are not the only one being directed or manipulated here. Fifteen years ago, I could not imagine raising a child and not caring. Yet somehow I do not. At least not as much I think I should. Don't let your mother... Don't let Lisa know, though I bet she suspects."

"So we are all abnormal?" she asked carefully.

"Yes, though I think you scared your brother with your exit. Though for a divine tantrum, it was probably fairly low key," Erwin said with a grin.

"Ha!" She started to giggle and then waved. "I'm going to bed."

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 4: Claws of the Crafter<strong>

Sheila looked over at the slightly changed look that Dana was wearing in the front seat of Dolph's car. She was sprawled out in the back seat of the car on the slightly faded leather, her feet barely fitting behind the driver's seat that was pushed all the way back. "Is that really necessary?"

"I'm a police officer. Getting arrested for trespass would be _very_ bad, capiche?" the darker-haired Italian-Greek said over her shoulder.

"She's got a point. Me, I don't care about another problem with the police," Dolph said as drove his car though the pleasant university neighborhoods. "Already got a rap sheet."

"I wonder what that is like," the youngest scion mused to herself.

"I'm sure we'll get you arrested before too long. You are just lucky you are so young that they'll just stick you into Juvie," the big Asgardian said.

"Yeah, _I'm_ the one that will get hammered for aiding and abetting minors in a crime," Dana said grumpily. She was just glad that she could get by with an hour or so of sleep a day.

"There's Janeka and Tsukyo," the driver said as he noted the two standing near a big white van. The black and chrome Mustang pulled into a parking lot and scritched to a halt. "Huh. Guess I should play with those brakes a bit more." He stepped out of the car and stretched. "Heya!"

"Hey big guy!" the half-Japanese scion called right back.

"I forgot to ask you, Dana, but did you get a cryptic warning..."

"...to not go back to Peru and dig up old secrets from my mother? Yeah. And Dolph and Sheila mentioned that on the drive over the Bay Bridge. I guess we just won't go back to Peru... to go back into that complex. Eh?" the slightly older woman said with a quirky grin.

"Exactly. But I think first we want to get a peek into the back area. There are three main entrances into the basement. It's not really a high security building." Janeka pulled out five swipe-cards that had circuit boards attached. "These are designed to counter the security at the doors. As long as you look like you are supposed to belong, most of the students and technicians will just ignore you."

Everyone crowded around the map to look it. Everyone memorized it to the best of their ability.

Tsukyo frowned. "I don't think that map's totally accurate, man. At least it doesn't match that building." He was studying the building.

Janeka frowned, then nodded. "Might be a travellers thing. Your dad is known to have some of that sort of stuff. Tsukyo and I will go in here, you three go in here. Avoid the main elevator and use the stairs right next to it."

"We'll just ignore the freight elevator?" Dolph asked.

"It's right in the view of the whole room," the scion of Ares explained. "Stairs should be a bit less conspicuous. Got some headsets that look like blue-tooth's for your phone. Everyone ready?" She handed out the micro-headsets.

At everyone's nod, they walked up to the main entrance and with a swipe, walked in like they owned the place. Dana led her group to the left, their feet treading softly. The big Asgardian felt a bit self-conscious as he tried to be as quiet as they seemed to be, the two almost gliding across the ground.

"Is that a Dodekatheon thing?" he complained.

"I think it's 'not a huge guy' thing. Of course, I think your are stronger than both of us combined," Dana noted as she spotted the elevator and the emergency stairs next to it. She walked over to a vending machine while two older technicians walked out of the elevator. She dropped in a couple of dollars and bought a candy bar.

"Clear, but someone is coming," Sheila whispered as she listened hard.

"Low voices only. Whispering carries further," the daughter of Artemis instructed. Another swipe of the programmed hacker card had them in the stairwell and taking the stairs down. Dana peeked through the window at the bottom door. "Bingo. Unless Berkeley Cal. added cyborg monsters to the facilty, that cyclops is our red herring." It was a huge room, at least thirty feet tall and more than sixty feet wide. Pipes and conduits hung from the wall and ceiling.

The Cyclops was wearing a leather apron and rough pants as it loaded a pallet with a few boxes and a crate. There was a strange electronic and clockwork crown attached to his head while both of his arms had been replaced with massive bronze and brass arms, powered by gears and pistons. With negligent strength, he loaded the pallet onto a hand-lift and then pulled it to the elevator.

"They are clearing out," Sheila realized. The rest of the room is empty.

Dana tapped her headphone. "Janeka, we need to capture that Cyclops and that pallet he's loading onto the elevator."

"Go!" the scion of Ares called out.

Both doors kicked open as the scions charged. Dolph had pulled out his spear already and roared out a challenge as he dashed forward. "Hiyahhh! Fight me!" he bellowed as he slammed his spear down on the Cyclop's armored bionic arm, denting it.

"Huuur-Click- Die!" the monster roared back. His massive, metal fist slammed home against the quickly raised spear, nearly buckling Dolph's knees and cracking the concrete beneath his feet. His second punch caught Dolph on the shoulder with a glancing blow, leaving a painful bruise.

Dana had slipped shadows over her face while pulling out her hand-sickle as she moved up, while Tsukyo charged forward and punched hard, thunder echoing through the building and knocking the Cyclops over three feet. Janeka's .454 Casull boomed almost as loud as the thunder the son of Susano-o was using with his fists, sending a spray of blood from a small wound.

Sheila was right behind Dolph, but leaped over and behind the cyclops. She grabbed the pallet lift-pull and was starting to pull it away from the elevator door when it dinged. "Uh oh."

So she was quite surprised when it opened to admit a stocky fellow of five foot ten. Under his suit, you got the impression of heavy muscles. "Hmm. It looks like some _heroes_ managed to beat me here. I forgot how they always cropped up in the mortal world."

"I think I'll double that 'uh oh'," Sheila said to herself as she pulled out her pistol. "Who are you?"

"I thought you were a daughter of Athena? She must have been incredibly lax if the tale of Nephele and my infamy is not even told these days," the ancient Grecian said with a sneer.

The youngest scion's answer was to fire her pistol repeatedly, only to blink in shock as he blocked them with his forearm. She was just starting to step back when he flickered forward in a blur and punched her in the center of her chest. Pain exploded as she heard her her breast-bone seperate from her ribs and crack.

The Cyclops finally noted the new presence and immediately turned his back on the two scions. "Danger," it rumbled loudly. With a roar he charged and launched a punishing double-fisted hammer-punch at the much shorter man.

Sheila's left leg clipped the Cyclop's armored arm as she spun through the air and smashed against the wall. She was already unconscious as she sprawled bonelessly on the ground on broken limbs.

"Sheila!" Janeka shouted. She was suddenly snapping shots at the dark and dangerous stranger.

"Whoa, crap," Tsukyo said as he danced back.

"Hmm. One of the titanspawn Therosius's tribe. The missing brother that they had been yammering back. Interesting. Whatever is here is not being condoned by Zeus," the demigod said in bemusement as he blocked three punches from the Cyclops. "That makes me _very_ curious."

"Dolph! Grab a crate and run," Janeka shouted loudly. "We need to get the hell out of here." She snapped off a careful shot at the deadly stranger, only to see him dodge the attack easily. "Shit."

The big Aesir almost snarled as he felt the urge to charge against the powerful newcomer and best him in personal combat. With a surge of will against the bloodlust rising in him, he turned and snatched the biggest crate and then started to run towards the stairs.

"She's dying," Dana said as she checked the young girl's vitals. "She's can't be dead- Wait, got it." She reached into one of the larger pockets on her cargo pants and pulled out the strange statue of Professor Stanton's Peruvian dig. "It's a healing relic. So maybe it can help."

The magic within the mysterious relic was alien and fought her. She bit her lip, drawing blood as she struggled to tame it. From a deep wellspring within her divine ichor, she managed to guide the torrent of healing energy. Bones realigned and knit together even as pulped organs became 'merely' bruised. The youngest scion started to breath raspily.

"Dana, move it or that guy is going to kill us all." Janeka just stared in awe as the demigod started to _rip_ the Cyclop's arms off. "He's really Ixion? He's supposed to be trapped in the deepest pits of Tartarus."

Ixion snickered even as he stomped on the foot of the Cyclop's foot, pulping the limb. "Since you recognized me, I'll give you one chance to flee, little sister." His dark eyes gleamed in the shadows of the physics building's large basement. "Run."

"Do it! Let's get out of here," Janeka shouted even as she watched the demigod of artifice and betrayal rip the cyborged Cyclops to bits.

* * *

><p>An hour later, they were parked back at Dolph's apartment above the little garage he worked in.<p>

"Did you see what he was doing to the Cyclops? I was barely hurting it, even with my gauntlets," Tsukyo was complaining.

Dana was busy binding up Sheila's ribs. "You recognized him?" she asked the ebon-skinned scion of Ares.

"Yeah. Nephele was a trick copy of Hera that was used by Athena to prove that Ixion was a traitor. He's another child of Ares like me, but he was a kin slayer, lusted above his station and was supposedly bound in Tartarus on a spinning wheel of fire. He's a real piece of shit. Even the gods didn't like him," the business woman said. "And he's way way more powerful than us."

Janeka was currently going through the box of equipment they had found, which was quite high end in electronics and solid state electromagnetics.

"You don't think we could take him?" Dolph asked angrily. Somewhere during the drive, he had reverted to his terrifying visage to match his mood.

"If we had a plan and he is stupid enough to fall into a trap, we can take him. Lots of ifs and buts though. This is some really weird shit. I managed to recover some of the programming that they were using. I don't even understand the science behind what is going on. Quantum and Super-String physics. I think this might be a part of a super-collider. One that makes any mundane one look like a tinker toy." Janeka had her notebook computer now hooked up to one of the electronic controller boards.

"What does it mean though?" Dana asked.

"I don't know. Normal physics I can think through better than most anyone else I know. This stuff... it's super-science. Stuff that I don't think people would even be working on for decades. Maybe longer. Like Star Trek techno-babble shit."

That was when the youngest scion groaned on the table. "Uhhh," she said far too elequently. "What happened? I remember the guy in the suit and him punching me..."

"I'd say something about a glass jaw, but I think he was just strong enough that he could break any of us," Dana said with a smirk and ruffled her hair.

"-thought I was fast-" Sheila mumbled. "-not enough-" The pain was so intense that she could hardly even think.

"I didn't even see the punch he hit you with, but you bounced off a wall. Dana found out she can heal a bit with that statue we, uh, borrowed from Professor Stanton," Dolph said as he cracked his knuckles while thinking about this Ixion.

"You're going to have to heal the last of the bruises and cracked ribs on your own. I give it a week or so," the daughter of Artemis said as she fingered the edge of her shining, silvery sickle as dark thoughts of vengeance congealed in her mind.

Dolph's front door open with the jingle of keys. "You guys look like a sorry lot," Sigmund said as he walked in with a twenty-four pack of beer in his hands. "Hey, son. You might want to watch for the dead. Somone's disturbing things."

"What the $*% are you talking about?" the huge teen asked as he jumped out of his seat to loom over his dead father.

"Just a message from the bitch. She sounded a bit disappointed in you. I guess she expected you to defeat that last guy, even if he could have killed all of you easily," the Einherjar said with a nasty smirk. "I think if you die you just become another faceless minion of Hel instead of her favored son."

"That is _not_ happening to me," the blond terror promised, clenching his massive hands so hard they creaked in fury.

Janeka frowned as her computer beeped at her. "Oh, crap." She was reading things rapidly. "Sheila, your mother's grave was robbed last night."

"-my what? When did Athena die?" Sheila slurred out as she tried to focus her bleary gaze.

"Nah, your mortal mother. The one that your step-parents adopted you from after she died in child-birth?" Janeka winced as she realized the girl had not know.

"Virgin goddesses adopt. Artemis explained that to me. It's all mystical and permanently binding," Dana explained seriously. "It's magic that only the gods know."

"Oh. Guess that makes sense," the youngest girl said woozily.

* * *

><p>Sheila hobbled to the front door of her step-parents house. The very basic crutches had to be moved carefully not to catch on the sidewalk. She raised a bruised eyebrow at the heavier <em>metal<em> door and then fumbled for a minute to unlock the door with her keys.

She waved to Dana as she drove off in her sedan. Her cousin had waited long enough to make sure that she was actually inside the house. The sounds of gunfire and explosions was coming from the living room, so she assumed that Anton was playing one of his games.

The shout from the doorway was quite startling. "What the hell, Sheila? You look like you went three rounds with one of the Klitschko brothers," the dark-haired ten year old said.

"He actually only hit me once," she replied with a pained grin.

The game paused in the background as three other kids turned the corner. The two boys and the one girl stared at her in amazement.

"I see you have friends over," the young scion said inanely. "Hello. It looks worse than it is."

"Who did that to you?" the young girl asked who must have been a friend in the neighborhood.

"He didn't exactly give me his name. If you don't mind, going to my room to nap out.


	2. Out of the Light

Chapter 5: Thief of the Dead

The next morning after sleeping in until seven o'clock, she was feeling well enough to walk without her crutches, though she winced at the pain in her knee. She was recovering at a breakneck pace compared to just normal people. Her bruises were already fading. She ambled down to breakfast where she saw both of her foster-parents. "Hello."

They both looked at the wounded apparition that looked like their strange daughter. Erwin nodded finally as he folded up his paper. "Are you all right?"

"Not yet, but give me a day or two and I'll be perfectly fine. I think I need to figure how to become tougher," she replied as grabbed a box of cereal and a bowl.

Her brother came in a few minutes later and stared at her for a long moment. "My friends think you get into street fights," he said with perfect sincerity. "What did happen?"

"A demigod punched me. Once." Hmm. Honey-nut Cheerios didn't taste as good when you had super-sensitive taste-buds, Sheila noted to herself.

"He hurt your face and leg with one punch?" Lisa asked as she looked from behind the Chicago Times.

"No, those got hurt when I hit the wall after he broke my sternum and collapsed my lungs." Sheila shuddered a bit at that. "The leg and face thing was after his punch." Hmm. That was was at least forty feet away. That was a _lot_ of force. "One of my cousins figured out some healing magic. Well, sorta. It's complicated."

"As long as you are okay," Anton said as he poured milk on his cornflakes.

Sheila's smart phone started ringing. "Hello, this is Sheila!" She was _really_ frowning when she finished and the phone disconnected.

Her fingers danced on the phone. "Hi, Dana. So Janeka really thinks that they might be after your mother? Yeah, I guess someone desecrated my birth-mother's grave." She really needed to learn the back story of _that_ ASAP. The youngest scion then nodded. "Is Janeka picking you up? Or are you going straight there?" She shook her head in frustration. "Yeah, that is out of your way from your police station. I'll just wait for Janeka. I'll see you there."

Dana was probably going to be angry about Sheila tricking the information out of her.

"What was that?" Erwin asked seriously.

"It appears the public grave of Marcy Cartwright was broken into and her corpse was stolen yesterday. And I just found out she died giving birth to me and then you adopted me." Sheila frowned as she stood up. "I'm going to the National Cemetery."

"Aren't you hurt?" Anton asked worriedly, touching Sheila's heart with his sincere feelings.

"I'll be fine. I just want to get there quickly. I guess Dana mentioned that we would be too late again." She was tying her running shoes on and out the door wearing a T-shirt and shorts in only a few seconds, something that would fit in just about anywhere.

"Sheila!" Lisa called out.

She was already halfway down the block, running fast. Her knee was holding her back a bit, but she was mostly all right. With a burst of legend, she was passing the cars quite easily and her leaps took her over shorter houses and oncoming traffic on cross streets.

* * *

><p>The view from the top of the hill for the graveyard was actually pretty amazing, Sheila decided. To the northwest the Golden Gate bridge spanned across the bay, though it was a little hidden by all the really tall trees. Then she turned her gaze to the almost full graveyard that was mostly used for military interments.<p>

"They tricked me into going to the wrong graveyard." Sheila closed her eyes as she tamped down a momentary spike of anger. They were probably just doing it for her own good. She could not believe she actually fell for it, as this was obviously a military only cemetery. "Well played, Madam White." At the twinge from her knee, she sat in the shade to rest the leg. After rubbing the leg a bit to help with the pain, she set her status on her phone's social links to 'Tricked!' and then frowned as she tried think through her problem.

And that problem was a bit thorny because, for the most part, Sheila had been rather useless and a hindrance. Of all of them, she was the one that did the least, brought the least resources and was the one that got hurt the most. Her fingers gripped a tuft of grass tightly and ripped it from the ground, then threw it and the clod of dirt at a tree. Not that it was giving her much progress in solving said problem.

So, twenty minutes later, when she heard a scream she just about bolted to her feet. Far down the hill a couple were running for their car with three shambling figures. Sheila crouched slightly at the sight of the zombies that were walking along like a bad stereotype out of a movie when she realized that the center one had a minor limp that was real from twisting his ankle.

"Alive?" she suddenly realized as she noted the makeup and costumes with a sudden close up view. So this was some sort of prank? She moved forward twenty feet and crouched a bit behind a white headstone, studying the cemetery more closely. "No, a distraction."

On the western end of the cemetery, out walked more undead with fell purpose, following a African-American woman wearing a black and scarlet dress who seemed to be following the directions of something in her hand. It was as she was watching the new woman that she realized that these zombies were blank to her mystical sight that could understand all ailments and wounds of the living.

The young daughter of Athena started to move closer and when she got within fifty feet, changed her status to 'engaging the enemy' and sent Janeka a message and picture of the woman.

"I can't believe that _dumb luck_ put me here. I wonder if she pissed off Murphy recently?" Sheila reached into the band of her shorts and pulled her pistol, _Athena's Wit,_ from its hidden magic-space as the woman watched her undead dig up a grave with shovels and picks they had brought along.

Lady Mary Muerte smiled as her undead servants finished bringing up the plain casket. In her left hand she brought out dagger, fell with purpose and her personal relic. In her left she held a small, black statuette. "Vini non soti nan espirityèl tire revanj yo fè òf mwen! Vini non soti! Chante laterè OH nan Milieu la tristeman! Mare sa a nanm-"

Sheila's right green eye focused down the simple sights of the pistol and then she pulled the trigger twice to disrupt the ritual to summon the ghost. The dagger and the statuette both went flying. She then stood up and moved about a third of the distance closer while holding the gun on the woman. "Now that I've got your attention, why don't we talk about why you are stealing corpses."

"And who are you, bon zanme?" the earthy brown-skinned woman asked. "And why shouldn't I just have my zombies tear you limb from limb?"

"I'm Sheila," the younger girl said, her pistol pointed unerringly at the woman. "A scion, just like you, Loa. And I want to know what you did with my... mortal mother."

"Ah, the daughter of Athena. Damn chans pwan la," she snarled in a curse about her luck. "I thought your friends would be at the place I visited last night."

"So they were too late. Great. Not doing much talking about why you are here though," Sheila noted.

"Ah! I forget my manners. I am Mary Muerte. Lady Mary Muerte, demigoddess of my mother's vengeance. It is for a noble purpose, though most people think that digging up the dead and disturbing them is anything but that." The woman was actually very pretty, with black eyes and red lipstick applied in such a way to better her features.

"And why did you have to dig up my mother then?" the much younger girl asked. Demigoddess? She was suddenly _really_ wishing the rest of the group would show up.

"Because she died of neglect, that the gods forsook her as she bore their progeny like some cow being bred. Just like my mother. Just like the mother of Dana Vitali. With their power and their sacrifice... I'll reap a vengeance upon the uncaring, unthinking gods that play with human lives as if they are nothing! Less than nothing!" Mary Muerte hissed out in anger, her eyes almost glowing with red radiance.

"Did Marcy Cartwright agree to this? Or is she going to be used up as a sacrifice in death as she was used up in life?" Sheila demanded, suddenly becoming angry.

"Tch. Another mindless sycophant of the gods. Kill her," the dark-skinned woman ordered her zombies even as she suddenly dashed for her knife.

With nearly mindless moans, the zombies charged forward. Sheila crouched and then leaped through the air over the heads of the zombies to land next to the small metal statuette, snapping a gunshot off at the Loa demigoddess.

Mary yelped in pain even as the bullet ricocheted off into the distance, her tough skin only bruising from the hit. "Kill her!"

"They are way too slow," the young blonde shouted back. Her toe flipped the statuette up to her hand even as she stretched to reach around a gravestone, another crack erupting from her pistol as she backed away.

The Loa almost snarled at Sheila, but decided it was not worth more injury. The last shot had barely hurt, but the girl was going to nickle and dime her to death at this rate. She stepped into a shadow and disappeared to a shadow far, far away.

"That was cool." The young daughter of Athena thought to herself that she would definitely have to figure out some way to duplicate that. "Time to worry about these zombies though." She was backing up quickly while firing bullets at the leading undead, blasting chunks out of it.

Eight minutes into the fight, a pair of cops had shown up. The older cop, his dark brown uniform almost black took one look at the girl backing away just slightly faster than the zombies and whistled at what he saw. He narrowed his eyes at the measured gunshots ripping pieces off the undead. "That is no actor in a costume."

"Rube, how the hell do we call that in?" the younger cop said.

He grabbed his handset and hit the button to call. "Guns discharged in self-defense at the scene of a Code 247. Call in all available cops near the Golden Gate Bridge. Many dangerous perps." He reached back into the car and made sure the dash-cam was active as he popped the trunk. "Only call in what you have to put in reports, Gary. Just like always."

The two cops started firing as one of the zombies got distracted from chasing the blonde daughter of Athena.

"I'm going to be killed by zombies," Gary shouted in a panic as the zombie kept approaching.

Rube just snarled and grit his teetch as he pumped the shotgun, aimed and blew off a chunk of the undead that just hissed at him in anger. It was within thirty feet

The roar of a turbine V8 engine and the bugle of an airhorn heralded the appearance of a black and chrome Mustang that hit a bump, jumped fifty feet and then landed on top of zombie. One of its tires banged as it exploded from the hard landing..

Dolph opened the door first and stepped out of his car. "I guess that worked." The huge Aesir then reached into a shadow that appeared next to him and took out a large spear.

The black woman that exited the passenger side and moved to cover behind a gravestone did not look happy at all. Her .454 Casull boomed twice in rapid order, hitting another zombie. "Made it in time then. I can't believe we were tricked like that."

Another woman came out of the back seat (wearing a black shadow across her face) already had her silvery sickle out and at the ready as she charged across the intervening one hundred feet in a flicker of a mere three seconds.

"Wait up, Dana!" Tsukyo called out as he followed her out of the far too crowed back seat of Dolph's 'Death-Mobile', stretching from the weird contortion he had to put up with to get here.

"The hell?" Officer Gary Patterson said as the insane woman attacked a zombie with a sickle... and made it work as she sliced off an arm in one sweeping cut. The half-Asian kid behind her punched the same zombie and with a boom of thunder, rocketed it backwards to bounce off a tree.

"Super human kids to beat up zombies. This is as bad as those Japanese Power Rangers shows my kids watch," Sargent Rubin Brown said as he noted the zombie under the car was still wiggling. "Hey, you with the spear! It's not dead!" He pointed at the hand sticking out with his gun.

"Thanks!" the scary looking Aesir said as he carefully picked up his car and set it to the side. He hissed in anger as it sliced his calf with putrid claws.

Bullets from Sheila and Janeka started hammering home on the last zombie as it seemed to realize it was not going to get to any of its targets. The mangled zombie that had a car land on it clambered to its feet just in time for Dolph grip the spear near the end of the haft and with a massive swing, chopped it in half.

"Man, I didn't even have time to summon my Einherjar," he complained.

Dana and Tsukyo's zombie had bounced like rubber and clawed the son of Susano-o to only a little effect. They then double-teamed their target, slicing it up and hitting it with thundering strikes that left it scattered over a twenty-foot long smear in the grass.

"I think we got it," the daughter of Artemis said dryly.

"Yeah!" the sixteen year old teen responded with a grin.

"Okay, is someone going to explain to me why we were just attacked by night of the living dead?" Rube demanded.

"Voodoo witch trying to raise the dead over here. These were her minions. I think the two guys running around in costume were here to scare off people. Probably hired by her," Sheila said as she ran up. "Which reminds me, we should look at getting a grave exhumed and the body put someplace safe."

Janek just shook her head as she grinned ruefully. "Tried to keep you out of any problems and sent you right into the jaws of it."

"Dumb luck, which are the trademark of heroes everywhere, right?" the much younger cousin said glibly.

"And what sort of radioactive animal did you guys get bit by?" the younger and much more pale officer asked.

"We're old style super-heroes. Real Greek-type heroes, fella!" Janeka pushed the huge gun into its pocket space.

Dolph winced as he limped slightly. "Hey, Aesir here."

"You guys got hurt." Sheila pulled her owl amulet from under her shirt and concentrated as she held it up to the big, scary blond and then the younger half-Asian. "Is that better? I think I did that right."

"Huh, just a bit bruised," Tsukyo noted as he poked as the rip in his shirt.

"Sarge, I don't think this is going to write up well," Gary said to his partner.

"Gary, you have the gift of understatement." The senior officer quickly cancelled the emergency call for officers, but requested officers to help with bodies. He blinked in astonishment as the big, scary kid had popped his trunk to pull out the spare tire.

Instead of using a jack or tools, he was holding up the car off the popped tire with one hand while loosening the lug-nuts with the other. Faster than either policemen could have done it _with_ tools, he had the tires swapped.

The two 'brains' of the band were standing in front of the headstone that had been dug up.

"Serena Alta Verapaz, died twenty years ago." Janeka had her phone out and pulling up public records. "Said she died just six months after joining the navy of unknown medical problems."

"Mary Muerte (which just screams pseudonym) said she was gather spirits in revenge against the gods," Sheila explained.

"She does list that she had two children (twins) but gave them up for adoption in her home country and then applied for asylum to the United States due to 'local religious persecution'. After a year or so here in the United States she signed up. There's a little scandal that she had hid her medical problems," the daughter of Ares said from the information she was reading. "No other family is listed."

"We'll have to keep an eye out for any scions from Central America then."

Janeka just gave the younger girl a roll of her eyes at her obviousness.

"Hey, just trying to make sure we are all on the same page here," Sheila protested.

"Okay, okay. Looks like the rest of the cops have arrived," the dark-skinned female noted as several more cop cars had arrived

"Looks like Dana took off, which is probably a good idea," Tsukyo said from where he had been studying the area and the young woman in the grave. "She was sick like my mother?"

"And three of our mothers died in child birth," Sheila said, jumping to a conclusion. "I guess bearing a half-god child does something _bad_ to the mother."

* * *

><p>Captain Howard Milton was driving up, as Sargent Rubin 'Rube' Brown had explained over the radio that this was like that night five years ago in the Tenderloin. "Rube, what the hell did you fall into this time?" He really hoped it was not another bloodsucking undead. The big black man was <em>not<em> looking forward to the interviews, reports and borderline falsifying that this might end up requiring.

The other black officer clapped his partner Gary on the shoulder and walked over. "Damnedest things. Not as bad as that shit in the Tenderloin when I found out about crap that goes bump in the night, but still pretty damned weird, Howie."

Howard gave his old 'rookie' partner a flat look. "It looks pretty bad. How many bodies are there?"

"At least six or seven. Difference is that the damned super-kid brigade over there." Rube pointed out the five kids that were standing next to grave about two hundred feet away as a couple of San Francisco's finest watched them closely.

"Other than they are contaminating my crime scene, what am I supposed to be seeing, Rube?" the captain asked.

"Super-kids. I think a few of them mentioned they are old-style heroes, like the Greeks. Except that big blond mother-$%. He said he was Aesir. And changed the flat tire on his car without using any tools. Tools like a lift jack or wrench." At Howard's incredulous look, he just nodded. "No kidding. He landed on one of the zombies with his car and instead of driving off of it like a normal person, he just picked it up and moved it out of the way."

"He pushed his car-"

"No, Howard, he _picked it up_ and put it to the side. Like you would a heavy box."

The captain frowned. "They a danger to our men?" He studied the skinny black girl, the skinny white girl, the big white guy and the half-Japanese kid off a way as he started to walk.

"Nah, they seem to be here to stop the girl," Rube replied to his older friend.

The quartet looked over as two more cops showed up. "Afternoon, folks. I understand you were a bit helpful to Sargent Brown. Now, if you don't mind me asking, what the hell is going on here?"

Janeka looked like she was thinking hard about how to respond.

"A bit of luck while we tried to stop a mad woman that is raising the dead for nefarious purposes, sir," Sheila spoke up quickly.

"Mad, you say? Who is she?"

"She called herself Mary Muerte, Demigoddess of Mother's Vengeance. She's a very demented woman with a lot of supernatural power," the youngest scion said. "She's raising these dead for a pretty evil purpose and I happened to be here to stop her before she could raise this officer from the dead."

"What makes her dangerous?" Howard demanded harshly.

"My bullets bounced off of her and she has zombies? Knows magic and can teleport away?" the youngest scion replied.

"Where'd your fifth person go?" the younger sergeant suddenly asked.

"She's not much for the limelight," Janeka said quickly before the others could reply. She had been listening and watching her cousin closely, as it appeared she had a golden tongue. "The important thing here is, is what is going to happen to us?"

"Seems to me that some concerned citizens were just helping stop a grave robber, Howie. I mean Captain Milton," Rube said quickly.

"This body needs to be kept in a safe place so it can't be raised," the youngest blonde girl said. "I don't know what she's doing, but she needs more mothers of demigods to fuel her spell." Sheila clenched her small fists tightly.

"Mother of demigods... Son of a bitch..." Howard was suddenly studying all of them. "All of you?"

"Whatcha talking about, Howie?" Rube asked his older friend suddenly.

"They're demigods. That vampire in the Tenderloin mentioned that there was a demigod vampire hunter, don't you remember?" the captain of the San Francisco police said. "We probably couldn't keep these kids in jail if we tried."

"So you got a smooth story about this? One that doesn't lose us our job and get us sent to the funny farm?" the younger officer asked.

"We responded to weapons being fired and bodies being desecrated, but failed to capture the persons responsible. Though a witness at the scene did give us a description of a perpetrator. We get the bodies bagged and the dug up body put into the locker in the secure section. And I get to talk to the commissioner about more crap that goes bump in the night," the police captain explained.

Tsukyo frowned. "He knows about it too?"

Howard actually laughed at that. "Seems to be a tradition here. Older officer drags their rookie partner through the weird shit. I had never even heard of Selkies before he and I ran into one down on the wharfs."

Then it was just a matter of filling out paperwork and making it all match.

* * *

><p>Janeka exited the taxi with Sheila. "Yo. Wait here on the timer, 'kay?"<p>

The Chinese behind the steering wheel just nodded suspiciously. "You no run away without paying!"

The black girl rolled her chocolate eyes and pulled out a fifty. "Just wait here, okay?"

"Okay! I wait here long time!"

Sheila raised an eyebrow at her cousin who happened to the daughter of her mother's rival. "What's going on?"

"We're having a chat about you and nearly getting killed," the daughter of Ares said. "For a cousin through my dad, I think I even like you a bit. But I don't want your death on my hands, girl."

"That's good, I don't intend to die. But do you think you would have done better when you are hit by the three thousand year old demigod?" Sheila replied in a stubborn tone.

"Maybe. Maybe not. But it'll be my head on a platter and my ass in hell if I get a young kid like you killed. So we are gunna do something about that. I wear a flack jacket under my hoody. I think you should wear some armor, too."

"How about the others?" the younger girl asked.

"From what I understand, Dolph has his heavy leathers and Dana wears a bullet proof vest. And I know that Tsukyo is pretty tough. He shrugged off several shurikan in New York. You're the only one that's been badly hurt and doesn't wear armor. So that changes or you get to stay home." Dark eyes bored into her like hard bits of obsidian. "Your blood ain't gonna be on my hands."

Sheila did consider the matter. "I guess you are right. You don't happen to have a nemean lion pelt hanging around, do you?"

Janeka started laughing. "No, sorry. You'll have to get by with just mortal stuff right now."

"Well, you better be off to your motel."

"I should just buy the damned room," the daughter of Ares grumbled.

Sheila turned and walked to the front door of her foster-parent's house and opened it up.

* * *

><p>Two days later, Sheila walked up to the repair shop that Dolph lived at and worked at in his odd spare time. Rapping on the door, she finally got him to answer the door.<p>

"What?" the young giant-seeming man asked as he rubbed his hand through the silky length of his blond-white hair. "Oh, yeah. Is it ten o'clock already?"

"Thanks for letting me use the shop," she said to the big Aesir. "How's your car?"

His Mustang was up on lifts and the tires were off.

"Messed up the springs and shocks with the stunt. I traded with some guys for some stuff, so I can finish it. You can use that area over there where I put the stuff that you got delivered." With a sigh, he went over to his black Mustang and started puttering. His glare at a bent shock was quite intense, but did not quite match his super-handsome face.

Sheila walked over to an area where several wood crates were set, popping them open to see sheets of metal, cans of expensive epoxies and rubber, special shears and a roll of cloth. She started to lay out the breastplate on the sheet metal.

"Oh, I was afraid that you did not pick up any talent for crafting. That would have been embarrassing the next time I saw Hephaestus," a woman said from right behind her only moments later. "I don't see how you can use your ichor in the quenching process though. You are just cutting and bending the metal."

Sheila just about jumped and only her superior reflexes allowed her to catch the pair of cutters before they flew off the bench and to the ground. "Ath-"

The gray-eyed woman put two fingers to her lips. "That must not be said. Not because I am not proud of you or your actions, but because more than three thousand years of planning is at stake. You can know, you can suspect, but I can not fully acknowledge. Is that clear?"

"Not really, but I can understand enough. So is this a social visit?" the young girl asked grumpily, though her mind was already trying to figure out the puzzle. Which was probably why Athena had said it that way, she admitted ruefully.

"In point of fact, this is a social visit. Unfortunately, I can not stay long to celebrate you ascension to partial divinity. No longer are you merely mortal, but you are in fact an actual demigoddess." The goddess reached out and touched the necklace about her neck, a spark jumping from her finger to the amulet. "Remember that you can always depend on wit and wisdom to get you through. These relics I crafted for you are now fully unlocked. These are powerful tools that can affect even a god's plans now."

"Can I get a hint about what I'm supposed to be doing?" the young blonde girl asked, her blue-green eyes studying her (mother?) closely.

"No matter what the other gods say, you have to know the Lost Pathways and why they are lost. Do not give up on learning why Ixion was searching. What he seeks, he must not have but you must uncover." Athena suddenly looked over towards where Dolph was attaching a new shock to his Mustang. "I have to depart. You are not the only one that will be visited this day. And Hel must not know of me in this time."

And with that, she disappeared in a flicker and flash of blue-white light.

Not a moment too soon, it seemed as the ground rumbled and a patch of concrete crumbled to dirt as a goddess of most beautiful _and_ horrid features appeared.

"Dolph Helson, Prince of Helheim... I would have words with you," the goddess said. "On this day does your dread legend truly begin. And your enemies have begun to seek you out." Her robes fluttered around her as the temperature dropped by thirty degrees. Her half-skull face had a spark of cold-light deep within its eye socket.

"Mother. Have you come to take away even more from me?" the Aesir snapped out.

"Tempting... but I am a devoted follower of Odin and killing those that he has allied with would not be the wisest course of actions." Her single blue eye studied her son closely. "Unless I am forced to due to the _actions_ and attitude of the one I am visiting, of course."

"I get it," Dolph replied after a truly murderous glare.

Sheila was very glad she did not have half the antagonism of that relationship. She turned back to her designs and pulled out a new sheet, starting to scribble. "Ichor. Perhaps I can mix it into the epoxy for the Kevlar," she mused aloud as she started to scribble. "But I need to know its chemical composition."

The cut on her palm was harder to inflict than she had thought as she tried to bring up her legendary essence to the surface. A black that was so pure, so full of every color imaginable welled up as a thick goo; an absence of light that had its own radiance.

So when she focused on the wound and saw it close up, she smiled. She was going to become stronger, no matter what.

* * *

><p>Chapter 6: Forgotten Foes of a New and Old Age<p>

"Gear check?"Janeka called out as the rest of the group pulled out their travel bags from the van and Dolph's car. They were all parked up in the mountains to the south-east of San Francisco, near the entrance to the Forgotten Paths. Sunbeams shown through the clouds in the bright morning light.

"Why do we have parkas?" Tsukyo asked in confusion as he pulled one out of the van.

"That really cold portal, right?" Sheila called out as she grabbed several large duffel bags and followed Dana into a cabin that the rich daughter of Ares had bought on the edge of the public lands. It was a large, two-story affair at the top of a dirt road. It's large A-frame and muted colors actually made it hard to spot among the pine trees at this elevation.

Samantha, one of the Amazon followers of Dana, just nodded. "I'd assume so."

The other Amazon tried to grab one of the duffel bags from Sheila. "I can get that kid, don't hurt yourself trying to prove something." Roxie grabbed the bag and then almost dropped it on her toes. "What the hell?"

"I'm stronger than I look. I _am_ just as much a demigoddess as the rest of the group," Sheila said as she glared at the older (and much stronger looking woman.) She grabbed the eighty pound duffel with one hand and slung it back over her shoulder.

Ten minutes later, they were finished unloading the bags and filling up their backpacks.

"So, let me see your armor Sheila," Janeka called out.

The youngest scion nodded. "Right. I'm actually already wearing it. It's basically a suit of Kevlar that has full armor at points. Chest plate, greaves, vambrace and pauldrons. I made it from high strength steel layers and Kevlar epoxy composites. It's probably not the strongest suit of armor, but not bad for a first creation," she said as she removed a light leather jacket to show the mottled pattern on the metal armor.

"Shee-it, kid. I was expecting you to get a bullet-proof vest or something." The ebon-skinned demigoddess said. "I knew I should have taken the time to make myself something, but I was busy working with my new toy." She pulled out an object of brass, steel and copper about the size of a large breadbox. Slapping the center circle, it sprang to life, looking nothing less than a skinny version of a terminator robot, A T-850 just like in the movies.

"You are making a terminator?" Dana asked in consternation. The Greek-Italian woman had her dark brown hair pulled back tightly in a ponytail.

"Well, this version isn't armed, but he can carry stuff and follow simple orders.

"Did you use some of your ichor like I did for my armor?" Sheila asked curiously.

"A bit, but I need a lot more work yet to make it truly sentient.

"Roger-roger," the robot said.

Everyone except Janeka groaned and then threw the lightest weight and non-lethal object at the inventor and business woman that they could grab.

"It wasn't that bad," she protested.

Everyone just gave her a look of disbelief.

* * *

><p>Everyone but Janeka and the Amazons was heavily loaded and tromping up the hidden path. Dana stopped at the edge of the path to brush some dirt off the bottom edge of a rock. "Native Amerindian pictographs." Her fingers glided over them for a second. "I'd assume they are magical in nature."<p>

"Coyote's blinding of the Eagle Eye. I'm no expert in magic, but probably a ward against people seeing it," Sheila noted aloud.

"Considering I can't see where Dana just went, I'd have to agree," Roxanne said while pointing up the path. "It just ends right there."

"She really can't see me. Or hear me?" the daughter of Artemis asked. In fact, it looked like Dolph or Tsukyo could not either.

"I really don't think they can, girl," Janeka replied. "How are we going to work this?"

Dana was looking around and studying the path. "We're only about a thousand feet from the entrance, right?" At Sheila's nod, she continued with, "Then we can just carry them back up there after unloading our equipment."

Sheila had been studying the path that led up and back. "Let's do that," she decided.

Neither the two Amazons or two demigods were happy about being carried, but everyone made it to the entrance.

"Greetings, Friends. All are welcome," Sheila said as she studied the strange pictographs for almost a minute. It had wavered and shifted before her eyes.

"What? How the hell can you read that?" Janeka asked, her brown eyes open in shock.

"I think its something new I picked up when my mother visited me and explained about us having become demigods," the younger girl replied.

"Well how about that, she's a universal translator. Too bad she can't share it with us directly," Janeka said with a grin.

Tsukyo put his palm on the door and pushed it open. "Seems easier now."

"Probably because we are demigods now. And doesn't that just sound conceited," the big Asgardian said with a shake of his blond tresses. He looked more imposing in his thick, heavy leather jerkin and pants he was wearing as a light armor.

They moved into the large passageway, their heavy duty flashlights.

"This seems to be an ancient history of North America and the native gods. I don't recognize some of them, but they are bid welcome by the god of travellers, Kuros of _Atlantis?_"

They all stopped to look at the strange pictographs that she was pointing out.

"Atlantis? The same place that Plato said was filled with worshippers of Poseidon?" Janeka asked as she thought furiously.

"Is that the secret that the gods do not wish known?" Dana asked herself curiously. "Hold up a second." She reached into a pouch and pulled out her bag of finger bones and channeled a bit of her mother's twin brother's power.

Her eyes snapped open, pupils entirely white. Her voice, when it spoke, was filled with echoes of dozens of men and women. _"Secrets buried here lead to our future which is the past, where the fallen gods pound on their prison doors and wail their anger for eternity against their betrayers."_

"That sounds ominous," the blonde Amazon Samantha said in a hard voice.

"Fallen gods?" Sheila looked over at Janeka and Dolph.

"How does a god fall?" Tsukyo asked with a frown.

"That's the million dollar question, sun boy," the daughter of Ares noted. "Why don't you light our way onward?"

Tsukyo snickered even as he glowed with the soft brilliance of the sun. Past the first antechamber, they came to central pit that went up and down.

"Heads up? Tails down?" Janeka asked as she pulled a silver dollar out of her pocket.

"You brought a roll of silver dollars, too?" the youngest scion asked.

"Just in case we have to cross the River Styx, ayup."

"Sounds good," Dana said as she looked down into the darkness.

The coin flickered through the air to land on her palm and slap to the back of her hand. "Heads it is."

Two hundred feet up was another passageway, to no one's surprise. The pictographs on the walls talked more of the great friendship between the King of the Ocean and the King of the Mountain.

"Zeus? This actually speaks of mighty Zeus and the battles that he and Baduras fought against the Titans," Sheila translated.

Dana opened the passageway, revealing another mountainside with the moon over head. "On the other side of the world, it appears."

"GPS has us on the slopes of Mount Olympus," Janek noted as she pulled some information from her portable computer.

Dolph was studying the rock around the edge of the cave entrance. "This has been formed so that its almost impossible to climb."

The vengeance driven daughter of Artemis was also studying this. "Does this seem odd to you guys?" Her mind was putting together a strange picture of this scene, this mystery... and it was just not adding up. "For a way to get around the Earth, the gods seem to really not want anyone to use this."

"What do you mean?" the sixteen year old son of Susano-o asked, his dark eyes watching her intently.

"They are treating this more like a deep, dark secret that should not be unearthed, rather than a neat shortcut across the world that has been forgotten," Janeka said instantly. "It's like this is a dangerous secret."

"Three of the entrances lead to just semi-remote places on the Earth. Which isn't really that big a deal. We saved hours of travel. Maybe even a day, but flying across the world in a short time is no big deal. I bet Hermes could even do it faster by himself." Sheila was frowning. "Which means the big bad secret is what is written on the walls or the floors."

"So we should go to that room on the ground floor?" Dolph asked. "That seemed to be the key map and information."

They all nodded at that. Dana closed the door behind them and they went back through the antechamber and then to the pit.

"Hey, guys! Look at what I can do!" Tsukyo called out as he stepped out into the air while touching his leather collar. "I can fly!"

"Can you do that all day?" Janeka asked as she felt a twinge from her shoulders.

Sheila had brought out her own relic, breathing deeply as she stepped out into the air. "A good while, I suppose." Flying! She was flying! She pointed her flashlight up and zoomed upwards. "I'm going to go see how far up this goes."

"Hey!" Janeka called out

There were only four more off-shooting passageways before she reached the end of the vertical tunnel. And with her air becoming visible, it was obviously very cold up here. What ever was capping this shaft was in dozens of ancient languages that were not supposed to even know each other existed, much less exist on one circular cap.

Her headset crackled with Janeka's voice. "You okay up there, kid?" the eighteen year old from Harlem asked.

"Just reading the capstone," she replied as Tsukyo arrived, glowing like a lantern. "Thanks, Tsukyo."

"Are you seeing anything?" He knew a few languages, but he was no real scholar. Mostly just high school German and Spanish. Well, and some Japanese his mother had insisted he learn.

"Actually, I think its what I don't see here. There is no Atlantean script. Which means this warding was put here by all of the other gods." What was so important that _all_ of the gods worked together? "We should get back to the others."

The two demigods dropped down the shaft, easily catching up to the rest of them.

"Meep-beep," the half-Japanese demigod said with a laugh, getting a confused look from Sheila about the pop-culture reference. "Want a lift, guys?"

"How far down do we have to climb?" Dolph asked as he looked over at Janeka who was struggling slightly. She seemed to be the only scion that did not yet have a measure of beyond human strength.

Dana glanced down with her eyes that could see through any darkness. "About fifteen hundred feet, I think."

"Almost exactly," Sheila noted as she calculated the distance between each level.

"I am not going to climb my ass up and down a mine shaft when we've got perfectly fine flyers," Janeka said in a strong tone. She might be quite athletic, but she was not super-strong.

"Sounds like a plan," the youngest scion said. She floated over and piked up Janeka under her arms on one side, then floated over to Dolph.

"Can you carry both of us?" the near-giant teen asked a touch worriedly.

"You guys aren't that heavy," was Sheila's tart reply.

"B4-1, keep climbing down," the daughter of Ares called out to her robot.

Sheila dropped at a fast dash and in less than thirty seconds, lowered them both to the ground. "Ground floor, ancient mysteries!"

That got a laugh out of both of them, even as Tsukyo followed with Dana and Samantha. After one more quick trip to get the last Amazon and robot (still trying to climb down) they all moved to the large map that took up the massive, six-hundred foot wide room.

"This helps a lot to be able to speak the language. It really does seem to just be a map of the Pathway," Sheila said as she moved around. As a matter of course, she put herself at the south pole and then started to study the map. Her eyebrows creased as she tried to see what was wrong with the map. Because _something_ was really off. Something that was nagging her supernatural understanding of spacial understanding.

"What's wrong?" Dana asked, her study of interrogation allowing her to notice the distress of the girl.

"This map... It's not right." Her blue-green eyes danced to all the continents on the map in front of her... That was when she realized what was missing. She looked down at her booted feet that were standing where Antarctica should be. She suddenly looked over to a very familiar land mass that was south of India, exactly where it was not supposed to be. "I- I-" She couldn't tell them?

"Sheila? What's wrong?" Janeka asked worriedly as the girl seemed stuck. Perhaps she just needed a pep-talk. "Don't worry, you can do it. You're a strong enough for this." A touch of legend and Janeka inspired her whole band.

The youngest scion latched onto that surge of will and fueled it with her own legendary essence. "Atlantis is Antarctica. And look at where it is!" she blurted out, shattering the spell that had been upon it, pointing at the land mass that was far moved from its modern location.

Every other head suddenly snapped around to look at the continent that _should not exist_.

"That's crazy, you can't just move a continent," Roxanne blurted out. The dark-haired Amazon suddenly shivered as a sudden wind blew through the room.

Everyone turned to look at the giant hallway that led out of the huge map room. Off in the distance, the cracking of ice and metal sounded.

"You must have broken the seal," Dana deduced as her occult knowledge and keen insight came to the fore. The daughter of Artemis slipped on her mask. "I think you might need your parkas."

The high arched hallway seemed more gloomy and the massive metal and stone doors were cracked open. The son of Hel did not feel the cold at all and the massive doors groaned open under his massive strength even as the others put on the fur-lined coats. "This isn't... normal," he said as he struggled to cope with the strange feeling that this was somehow _home_.

"Sheila? What does this say?" Dana, the mystic of the band, asked at a line of runes on the ground.

"It keeps saying that this is a barrier between life and death-" the youngest demigoddess was saying when she was cut off.

"Samantha! Stop! This is the Underworld" the dark-haired Italian woman shouted, stopping everyone.

Dolph was looking at his feet, which was easily over the line of letters obscured under the frost. "Uh-"

"-oh," Tsukyo echoed as he looked down.

"I think that you demigods are fine," Roxanne said slowly as she backed up, controlled fear on her face. "But us mere mortals may not do as well."

Samantha had stepped back, too, and quite quickly. "We will camp out on the map of the world and wait for you, mistress." The tough looking woman frowned at the mystical ward line as she clenched her fist in anger.

* * *

><p>The new room was huge and made of curving terraces twenty feet tall, covered in a layer of hard frost. Dim sunlight could be seen from far above, hidden in the disturbing mists that swirled around them. The five demigods tromped through it cautiously. Janeka was shivering, even with her parka.<p>

"Here, take mine. I don't need it. I'm not even chilled," the big Asgardian said. "Its even big enough to go over the top of yours."

The black teen nodded, even as she put it on and zipped it up. "Thanks. Man, I need to learn how to handle the extremes like you guys do." Of course, if it had been fire she could walk right through it without a problem.

They circled the thousand foot wide room, only to find the next entrance closed as solid as the last one and encrusted in huge amounts of ice. Tsukyo was glowing with the soft radiance of sunlight still, but that did not let them see through the ice easily.

"Down into the pit?" Dana asked the rest of the party. At their nods, they started hopping down the twenty feet quite easily.

Dolph was the least graceful, but strangely seemed to have a knack for standing on ice that the other just had to compensate for with their super-human dexterity. Still, they made a very fast pace as they went down hundreds of feet.

"Gah. They are distorting space and time again," Sheila complained as she realized they had gone down another thousand feet and the terraces should have met in the middle by now. "How are the folding space like that?"

"Man, that gives me an idea for a TARDIS chest or car," Janeka said with a pale smile. The cold was starting to get to her and that was upsetting. She clenched her jaw and tried to feel for her ichor. To control it and force it to do her will. Suddenly, the cold was not nearly as bad as her godly blood answered and adapted her to the below freezing cold of the ancient ruins. "That's better."

Dolph was nodding his head. "That's a cool idea. Time and Relative Dimensions indeed."

Tsukyo had caught the reference (which had flown over Sheila's head a bit) but was trying to wrap his head around the idea of _making_ something bigger on the inside than outside. "Can you really do that?"

"Its possible. I've got some ideas," Janeka said as she really considered the matter.

The last terrace below them led to a five hundred foot wide area cluttered with bones, armor and weapons in front of glowing portals on six axises. The armor was all of incredibly ancient style. In fact, the most advanced seemed to be a bronze breastplate, while next was of Greek style in beaten copper.

Sheila landed next to the piles of bones in one prodigious leap of one hundred feet. "I see several general-" she was saying as a skeleton stood up behind her in perfect silence.

"Sheila-!" Dolph shouted out in frustration as he realized what he had been seeing.

The young scion looked up. Without a bit of waiting, the skeleton lashed out with supernaturally powerful hands to cut her life short. If it had hit, it probably would have taken her head off, but somehow she flexed out of the way like prey would startle away from a predators attack. "Whoa!"

"Hyaaa!" Tsukyo shouted as he triple-flipped forward and then smashed a skeleton to splinters with a reverse-crescent kick with all the momentum from his leap. "Let's do this, girl!"

Crack-crack-crack, went Sheila's pistol as she quickly shattered another skeleton. "Hey Dolph! Isn't this your shtick?"

"Hardy-har," he growled and he crouched on the last iced terrace then leaped up straight for over a hundred feet to land on a skeleton with his suddenly enlarged self. Now almost ten feet tall, the Aesir turned (grinding the skeleton below him to dust) and then slammed down his spear on a second. His blow was so powerful it shattered the skeleton and cracked the solid stone beneath it.

"I almost feel the need to compensate for something," Dana replied in a dry tone as her sickle slashed out as she slid across the icy ground between several more skeletons.

Boom! Another skeleton shattered in half from Janeka's fancily engraved .454 Casull. "This is all easy, guys! Let's wrap this up so we can get home in time for supper."

Her words lit up their wills, imbuing them with the valor of war. And with that, all five demigods lit into the rest of the undead, who were far outmatched by their supernatural strength and speed. The undead barely scratched most of them, leaving only Dana with the harshest wound across her shoulder.

Dolph and Sheila both healed themselves, forcing their ichor to bind their flesh together with a brute force application of their legend. Sheila then held up her amulet, _Athena's Wisdom_, and turned the serious gash on Dana into just a large bruise.

"Handy kid," her oldest cousin present said, scruffing up her hair.

"Hey!" Sheila said, blocking Dana's hand from messing up her hair any more.

"Six portals for five of us?" Tsukyo noted as he looked at the glowing blue, rippling energy in the circles of shadows.

"Someone will have to double up. Or not," the mystically leaning daughter of Artemis noted. "I'd suggest picking one to go through as a group. No need to pull a Scooby-Doo."

"Start with the north side again?" Sheila asked the unofficial leader of the band. That was a cartoon, right?

Janeka just raised an eyebrow at the comment, then realized she was talking about the entrance to the Nazca pyramid they had found. "Couldn't hurt, I suppose."

Sheila put her hand up against the barrier and carefully pushed. It felt like sticky water and with a deep breath, she stepped past it. The other four followed her immediately.

* * *

><p>The band of demigods appeared in front of a portal; flickering and blue, a huge cavern filling above them with huge statues. Burning purple fire lit up within their empty eyes.<p>

_"Speak or be destroyed,"_ boomed a huge figure, half man and half serpent from the waist down.

Dana, Janeka and Dolph narrowed their eyes as they realized they understood the words, but had never heard of the language.

"We come in friendship and exploration," the daughter of Artemis called out, her ichor singing her to greet the guardians carefully and respectfully. "I am Dana-"

_"We recognize you, those who traveled away with Dorathi and Veroth. Have you come to return the Lost One?"_ it demanded.

All of the demigods thought that quite creepy, but it was the oldest one that continued. "We would gladly travel back with the Lost One, but he is unknown to us." Dana was quite ready to leap into combat at a moment's notice.

_"You do not lie."_ The ancient face seemed bowed and twisted in anger from his vantage fifty feet above. _"Return when you travel again with the Lost One."_ And with that, the purple flames flickered out of the empty eye sockets of each statue.

"Huh," Janeka finally said. "It recognized us."

"Is that what it said? Man, I must be the only person that can't understand weird languages," Tsukyo complained.

"I'm sure you can pick it up if you put some effort into it, Tsukyo," Sheila said in a soothing manner. "We don't quite have your grace and martial arts, after all. We are all good at different things."

Dolph struck the ground with his spear, feeling out to sense where they were in the ground. "We are in another pyramid and there is a passage behind the coils of his tail." He pointed at the giant statue they had been talking to.

"I think we can walk through it," the daughter of Ares explained as she shifted her .454 casull into a short roman gladius.

There was a small path, hidden behind the statue. There were three antechambers, each larger than the last until they came to a large metal gate, thirty feet tall.

"A'Badarus, the World of Badarus," Sheila translated for the rest of them.

"Let me get the gate," the huge Aesir called out as he grabbed the door ring and pulled. A massive bolt of crimson lightning blasted from the gate and into the floor _through_ Dolph, burning a four foot divot into the stone. "What was that?" The big demigod was blinking in surprise at the sudden light.

The other four looked at him, then the floor behind him and then back. Somehow he had shrugged off the attack like it was nothing or had not even existed.

The three cousins looked at each other in rapid order.

"That hit Dolph-" Dana said, trying to figure it out.

"-but didn't affect him somehow-" Janeka continued thinking fast and furiously.

"-like if he didn't realize it was coming-" Sheila noted with scrunched eyebrows.

"-and he was ignorant of the damage so therefore it couldn't affect him," the all chorused.

"Say what?" the half-Asian Tsukyo asked in confusion.

"Well, it's just a theory, but it seemed like since Dolph wasn't expecting or even saw the attack until it hit, he set his personal reality to 'ignore' the damage for a second. Sort of quantum gnostic reality-" Sheila started to explain as best as they could figure out.

"Huh. I suppose that's possible. So if I let go of this ring and grabbed it again, I'd get blasted and would get affected, because I know it would hurt?" the big Aesir figured out aloud. "Well, I have to admit, it was useful. But maybe we should disarm this trap."

Twenty minutes later, Dana figured out that the statue relic of the water goddess could be used to release the magic guarding the gate. The smell of the sea and a jungle filled their noses as they saw a huge body of water down at the bottom of the green-covered mountain they were on. In the sky lay a huge moon... no a planet with moons of its own. A gas giant of reds and oranges with pale rings that could be seen in the sky and reflected in the ocean.

Across the body of water was a massive set of lights like New York had met Arabian Nights. It was a huge metropolis.

"Toto, I don't think we are in Kansas any more," Janeka said softly, her chocolate eyes open wide in wonder.

* * *

><p>They camped out near the entrance, using the tents they had brought with their large packs. They kept a watch through the night, but nothing seemed to happen. The sun when it rose in the 'east' was quite red and then turned orange as the morning brightened.<p>

Tsukyo closed his eyes and tried to determine where they were in relation to, well, anything. "This isn't the mortal world," he finally said. "It's not the Underworld either. And I don't think its the Overworld." He was actually at a loss.

"Alternate reality?" Janeka thought aloud.

Everyone else just shrugged. They really did not have enough information to make a decision. Janeka directed them through the jungle where Dolph was leading the way, easily pushing through the undergrowth while Sheila and Dana kept him going towards the shore of the sea.

About noon, they arrived at the edge of a clearing where it appeared slaves were working a field of purple-leafed plants. There was a eight foot tall human, stooped and carrying a large whip that crackled with energy. His head and shoulders was covered in armor that was meant to intimidate.

The band kept to the edge of the jungle and sidled around towards the road that led to the seaside. The seaport had several docks for deep water ships and anchored at the and of the largest pier was a massive ship. It had three masts and bronze plating as armor hanging from its sides. Slaves worked the dock, lifting or dragging crates from wagons onto the ship. Warehouses and bars were the heart of this ancient seeming city.

"Well, we need to decide if we want to actually go in there and talk to anyone or if we just want to poke around outside the city," Janeka finally said about midday. They were watching just past some simple huts, hidden in the shadows under large ferns and practically invisible.

"I think I've spotted what marks the difference between a slave and owner. The owners seems to have some sort of jewelry either on their right arm, neck or headband and slaves have a tattoo. I did _not_ see any freeman that didn't have either," Dana said, her keen eyes spotting such nascent details from just a glance. "And we are a bit overdressed."

Indeed, for the most part loinclothes and sandals seemed to the only unifying clothing. The overseers had fierce helmets and greaves, cracking whips lashing the backs of the slaves. With the heat and humidity, the natives had opted for less is best for clothing as if it were something right out of a fantasy novel.

"We can always disappear into the jungle and then back through the portal. I mean, this has to be why that whole place seems to be taboo," Dolph argued. The big Norseman had a look like he was excited at the thought of the challenge.

Tsukyo nodded slowly. The sixteen year old dancer and aspiring actor had been thinking. "Then we need to try to blend in better. I wish I had my make up kit."

Dana blinked a bit in surprise. "You know how to do some disguises? Because I'm sure with our two brains here, we can probably make what you need." The oldest demigoddess (at twenty-four) had been thinking about just sneaking in.

"Of course. You can't get into the acting business without picking up some of the tricks of the trade. But I need something that we can use to darken your guy's skin and hair. I didn't see any blonde hair in the entire village," the Asian-American said. He gave them a winning smile.

* * *

><p>Sheila had to admit that she was quite surprised at the transformation that the group had undergone. She and Dolph were the biggest changes, as their skin had been darkened quite a bit and their hair was now a dark-brown. Janeka must have agreed with the look, as she seemed to get a bit distracted by the massively muscled and cut form of the Aesir, even tanned a darker brown than he would probably ever have been in nature. Sheila was also just about as distracted, but her mortification at being topless had her looking less at the men and more of trying to figure out if she could blend in while walking around with her arms crossed.<p>

Dana seemed totally unconcerned, having taken the transformation to fantasy warrior quite easily. She actually had her sickle on her hip to try to look more like the ruling class. The boots and sturdy pants helped with the image. With a shake of her head, her hair changed to a long, dreadlocked style of braids and her eyes turned chocolate brown.

Dolph raised an eyebrow at that and then closed his eyes. His features shifted ever so slightly as his skin color became more natural and his eyes turned almost black. "Hey, neat. I knew I could change some of my looks, but I hadn't tried to do that yet."

"Very cool, guys." Sheila tried to do the same thing, but found that it only gave her blue-green eyes an ache.

"Um, guys?" Janeka asked of her band. "Can we tone down the super-model looks at all?"

"That's actually the easiest thing," the Italian-Greek policewoman said. She scrunched her eyes closed for a long moment and suddenly looked quite a bit more ordinary and even looked 'just pretty'.

Sheila followed suite, though she appeared to be in that 'young movie star' level, while Dolph and Tsukyo went from beyond unearthly handsome to merely super-model in appearance. The boys had far outstripped everyone in appearance as their ichor had awoken.

"Well, that's an improvement, I guess," the very normal (and feeling very drab) African-American said. She knew she was not ugly, per se, but that was all relative in _this_ group.

The village they approached did not really have stout walls, but it did have a gate with a few guards. Those same guards seemed quite surprised at the five people ambling towards them.

"Halt, who approaches Endovari?" the leader called out.

Dana suddenly shifted her whole posture, a sneer appearing on her face. "How dare you presume to ask such a question of myself?" she snapped out.

The rest of the band quickly followed her lead, putting on angry expressions of outrage (even poor Tsukyo that did not understand the strange language they were speaking.)

The guard suddenly paled, his dusky skin looking quite unwell. "Your pardon, matron. But Endovari is closed to all people without a writ from the temple, so please forgive my impertinence."

"Stand not in my way," Dana bluffed coldly, "lest I slay thee for gazing upon me with unworthy eyes."

They quickly averted their eyes and moved out of the way of the five bare-footed demigods that were bluffing their way in. It was quite obvious that they were making quite the stir in the community. Down-trodden slaves looked at their feet in terror even as the citizens and slave masters seemed shocked at new people.

Sheila and Janeka's keen eyes were taking in more facts and information. The large temple in the center of town was built on a pyramid, but the building on top of it looked like an organic composition of a Catholic cathedral, the Parthenon and a spire with fluted columns. The two were comparing the relative technology, putting it at late roman with some technology from later periods. Aqueducts carried water through out the town and it seemed mostly sanitary, but they had never seen a more brutally oppressed people.

They wandered an hour, without realizing the subtle play of illusion and the movement of the crowds that carefully herded them to the plaza in front of the black granite temple. Dana and Janeka were starting to get a bad 'vibe' off the situation so looked to herd the gawking younger teens out of the area when they were suddenly brought to heel. The huge plaza in front of the temple was full of people and the disapproving visage of the gods at the edge.

"Green-eyes! Girl with the color of the sea within her cursed head, why have the hated gods intruded into our exile?" boomed a woman at the top of the stairs.

Sheila winced as she realized that she was the _only_ person that she had seen in the city with blue or green eyes. Lacking Dana's guile in the situation, she met the priestesses' gaze in total contrivance of their holy laws. "The _gods_ have not intruded upon your exile," she lied in a manner that would convince a laymen, but not the discerning eyes of the Atlantian.

"Fie, Daughters of Zeus, we know your lies. Our ancient lore from mighty Baduras tell of your scent and demeanor. We know you, demigods of evil! You are the ones that locked us in this hellhole!" the woman raged as her eyes lit with unholy, red fire. "Do you seek to torment us?"

Dana and Janek both saw the figure appear from thin air with a raised staff behind them and started to move, dodging bolts of lightning that would have struck them down. Tsukyo and Dolph _were_ both struck, with startling different reactions. Dolph gnostic approach to reality served him well as reality hiccuped and he found himself wondering where the small crater he was standing in had come from while the Scion of Susano-o found himself ravaged by powerful electricity, nearly knocking him sensate though really unharmed. Sheila, somehow without any warning or notice found herself rolling across the ground, the lightning only causing her hair to stand on end as she ducked the unexpected attack.

"Tsukyo? Are you all right?" Janeka shouted out, even as she pulled out her massive, black handgun. The .454 caliber handcannon boomed as it took out the first soldiers boiling out of the crowd that started screaming.

"Forks in outlets bad," he mumbled nearly incoherently in an attempt at humor.

Sheila was back on her feet almost instantly. Brandishing her amulet, her ichor sung and it healed Tsukyo of the most grevious of his injury, then barely ducked under a spear jab from the priestess. "Whoa!"

"Die by the grace of Baduras!" the wild, red-eyed woman screamed.

"I'll show you a spear," Dolph shouted as he seemed to swell and grow, The Shovel appearing in his tight grip to block an attack as he tried to force the Atlantean demigoddess priestess to engage him in battle. "She's not the dangerous one here."

Tsukyo laid into six warriors, his fists and feet flying faster than they could see with punishing and stunning force, sending them flying to bounce off of stalls or pillars with cracks of thunder. Dana had cloaked her face in shadows and gutted one soldier with her gleaming sickle, not an ounce of mercy showing from her brutal and deathly attack. Slaves and slave masters screamed as something impossible erupted in the middle of their normal business.

Sheila and Janeka had slid almost back to back, firing in rapid fire back to back to thin out the number of soldiers.

"They have vile magic! Kill the witches!" a bare-chested giant soldier shouted, his whip covered in lightning as he tried to ensnare the two gunners, but they were far, far too fast to be caught by such a slow move.

Dolph blocked a spear from the priestess, towering over her. "You should not have picked a fight with us. We were just exploring this strange world," he snarled out in anger, his blood pounding and demanding that he defeat the demigoddess in front of him as she was the greatest threat. Somehow his visage had turned terrifying and feral looking, his white-blonde hair reappearing and cold blue eyes glittered with the rage of the blizzard.

"Aesir! You abandoned us to create your new land of forever ice! Atlantis was the jewel of the known world! And you slew it even as you slew Ymir!" The wild-eyed woman was nearly frothing at the mouth as she swung with abandon at the nine foot tall Aesir. "Baduras! Save thy daughter lest the world of A'Baduras fall to shadow!" the priestess shouted out.

And Baduras answered with a thundering crack as giant, fifteen foot statues awoke at the edge of open plaza.

"Um, guys? We didn't want to start the War Between Worlds here did we?" the half-Japanese teen called out worriedly even as he parried or blocked a half-dozen spears and arrows.

"No, we need to get the hell out of here," the daughter of Ares called out, hiding a dark thought that her father would probably think she was weak for retreating. She snarled at the thought, but she ascribed to _smart_ warfare, not the brutish war that her father was known for.

Dolph smashed one of the attacking animated statues so hard it was sent flying into the temple, breaking off several pillars.

Sheila's blue-green eyes narrowed in thought as she realized that the whole structure was on the verge of collapse, charging across the ground near one of the animated statues. "Over here, mud for brains!" she yelled out lamely.

The statue was luckily stupid enough to actually fall for the insult, smashing the pillar that Sheila had been standing in front of. Its second punch mostly demolished the next pillar she had dodged to. Bullets were fired from her gun in rapid order, hitting a small flaw in the dark gray stone, finishing off the pillar. With a thundering crash, the building started to collapse over the shriek of the high priestess even as Sheila dashed down the steps with a preternatural quickness.

That attacking statues froze in place, some even falling over as their motive magic disappeared as the building crumpled and a cloud of dust enveloped the area.

The sky darkened even as a terrible howl erupted from the building as voices lamented on their release. The priestess of Baduras coughed within the dust even as pale, luminous figures clawed out of the remains of the building.

"Free!" six ghosts of ancient Atlantians cried as they clawed their way up to the surface. "Free to take revenge!"

The priestess stumbled backwards. "What? Who are you to claim revenge?" A hint of fear had appeared in her voice.

Their eyes glowed a deep blue, reminiscient of the sea itself as they spoke. The lead ghost, a male of broad shoulders and manacled sneered at her. "We are your older siblings, murdered to keep this world alive. Baduras fathered us all and then bound us below his temples. We were told we were his chosen, his gifted..."

"And we were, for an eternity in pain and suffering to our hated father!" a female ghost screeched. "Our souls to power the sanctum that is these realms!"

Another female ghost laughed at the priestesses' dumbfounded look. "She had no understanding, no inkling of the disaster that is to befall her at father's behest."

Dana tapped Sheila on the elbow, gesturing to follow while the Atlantians argued. Silent as possible, they regrouped just outside the temple district.

"That could have gone better," Janeka grumpled. The group looked a right mess, caked in dark gray dust and grime as they walked in a group, much like many slaves and their owners.

"I think its time to head home," Sheila said carefully. "And I think we need to discover what caused the gods to banish the Atlanteans."

They all nodded at that as they stalked through the city to escape back to their world.

* * *

><p><strong>Epilogue the First:<strong>

Sergio "Spike" Veceimo lit up a cigar as he waited for his contact at the back of a bar.

"Those things kill, didn't you hear?" a raspy voice said. "I understand you are having a supernatural problem. And have money."

Spike looked up, the scar on his cheek looking quite pale on his darkly tanned features, his gray hair showing his early forties age. "A hell of a lot slower than this vigilante. She's been starting to make some serious problems for the family."

"And you are positive she's not natural?" the gritty voice in the shadows said. The silhouette was not fully human, unless pointed ears counted.

"She kicked in a solid steel door and leaped a twenty foot security fence like a three foot hurdle."

The horrible, twisted face of a Nosferatu appeared, barely visible in the dim light. His craggy fangs glistened as he seemed to salivate. "And the normal protections didn't help? The vampire markings, the silver doorknobs and the cold iron nails?"

The mafia hitman almost shuddered at the sight. "No, nothing at all."

"Then I accept. It's been a while since I hunted,"

* * *

><p><strong>Epilogue the Second:<strong>

Janeka stretched, feeling a delicious popping sound from her back before she leaned back in her comfortable leather office chair. Most of her 'real' work was out of the way, so she had undone a couple of buttons on her suit and jacket while she took about the problem that her software engineers had sent her. Multiple monitors were busy showing lines and lines of code that she could easily decipher.

So she was quite surprised when the door opened and in walked a woman in a black suit. "Miss White," the woman said.

Her secretary was right behind the woman, but backed off when Janeka gave him a shake of her head. "Agent Walker, is there a problem?" the young black woman from Harlem asked curiously. "One of my programmer's hasn't been moonlighting as a hacker again, have they?"

"No, I have a more serious problem that I need help with. More of that under the table assistance that makes sure your records stay clean. And you even get to keep our country safe from terrorists that want to twist a knife in the vitals and make 9/11 look like amateur hour."

Dark, chocolate eyes had narrowed in anger at Walker's comment about her records as a teen hacker, but widened at that comment. "What do you mean?"

"I need your help to track down a terrorist cell that is smuggling in a large quantity of nuclear dust before they can make a dirty bomb."

* * *

><p><strong>Epilogue the Last:<strong>

High above the portals to the lost dominion of the race of Antlantean hung a figure, chained and bound in metal stronger than the stars in the depths of the Underworld. Demosia, Atlantean Goddess of Secrets and Darkness lamented silently in her torment as the Titan Avatar of the Night. She sensed dimly that her family still existed and that their people were not expunged from existence.

A single chain hung from her feet, dangling into the impenetrable darkness of her prison, siphoning just the tiniest fraction of her power and that of ultimate darkness. A red mirror hung from the end, a desperate ploy to escape their prison by her brother-husband Kuros and Skaft, the mortal that invented the knife and eventually ascended to godhood. Kuros's skill at travelling any road and Skaft's unmatched intellect had come up with a desperate plan in the last minutes as all of the other gods bound them. If they could not open pathways to the Overworld and the Mortal World, they would create their own world.

The shining mirror had been perfect and unblemished, but the blood and souls of a dozen demigods had been required to create the first world.

And so, in an ancient world, the Atlanteans survived even as all the pantheons of the world expunged the knowledge of their existence save for one lonely Pesedjet who whispered tales into Plato's ear.

But in this time, the mirror has absorbed the power of sacrificed scions perfectly. Only hours past demigods escape a single crack echoed through the prison as the mirror developed its first break. In A'Badarus, world of Badarus, an earthquake raged in a place where none had ever happened under its alien sky.

The end of the world had started.


	3. Quickening Pace

Chapter 7: Touch and Go

Blue-green eyes studied the black and silver Ford Mustang curiously. "Are you sure you want to do this?" the youngest scion asked the six foot nine mechanic as he carefully installed a new chrome chasing.

Dolph raised an eyebrow at that. "All I'm doing is adding a feature to my ride. With this, I'll be able eventually drive my Mustang underground or into the Underworld." Somehow, even in natty jeans and a T-Shirt, he looked more like a super-model with long, flowing blond hair than a gifted mechanic that hid a surprisingly smart brain under his too good looks.

Sheila nodded even as she wiped a smudge of grease off her cheek. "I suppose. With Janeka back in New York, things have been a little slow-"

The rapping on the door was quite surprising as it was a bit late at night. Sheila hopped over to let Dana in, only to be surprised when she checked the peephole that it was an unfamiliar, portly figure under the bare bulb on the porch. He did not look threatening, so she opened the door. A Scion? "Can I help you?"

The sandy-haired man with gray eyes just smirked. "Actually, I am here to help you and your friends. May I come in?"

Dolph was wiping his hands on a rag as he walked over. "So one of your cousins, I take it?" he asked Sheila.

"I guess so," the young girl replied. "I'm Sheila and this is Dolph."

"I figured as much. Martin Dean," the man said casually as he took in the workshop. "My father, Hermes, asked me to drop in and give you guys a few pointers on how demigods do some things. Mostly on the hidden ways."

"Janeka and Tsukyo are back East for some business, but I bet Dana would be interested. Let me give her a call," Sheila said as she pulled out her smart phone while thinking deeply on the fake seeming name. She frowned as the phone number failed to connect, stating that her phone was out of service. "Strange. Maybe she forgot to charge her phone."

"If this is a bad time?" Martin asked.

"No, not at all. Let me change into my work clothes. Don't forget your jacket, alright Dolph?" Sheila called out as she grabbed her dufflebag.

"Right," the Aesir said absently, not catching that she was trying to subtly warn him.

Five minutes later, Sheila came out of the cramped bathroom looking mostly the same. Her new armor was very lightweight and fit under her own T-Shirt, jeans and jacket. The steel-toed boots looked slightly out of place, not too strange for the young girl.

"So there's a obelisk not too far from here. We'll use it to pop over to say... New York." Martin led them down the street and in short order, into a small garden where a twelve foot tall stone tower stood. "You can use these babies to go anywhere where an obelisk has been planted. Rome, Greece, Egypt... you name it, there is probably one of them. Other famous building and statues can also be used. The Statue of Liberty is handy, as is the Eiffel Tower, though they aren't as common. Then you've got pyramids, famous arches.." the demigod son of Hermes explained. "If you take a minute or two, you can probably sense the touchstone location. Since I'm here to 'teach' you how to use them, I'll let you both figure out the mystical feeling." That got a weird laugh out of him.

Much to no one's surprise, Dolph was not the most mystically (or otherwise) perceptive scion. Sheila, on the other hand, was vying with Janeka and Dana for discerning senses and ability to read newsprint from across the street. She narrowed in on the touchstone on the back of the tower just within her reach.

"Not much more to it. Just focus on the obelisk in New York. You should feel the Legend of the obelisk in the cemetery on the west side," the Scion of Hermes was explaining.

"Ready, Dolph?" Sheila asked casually as she heard Martin tap a button on his own cellphone and it beeped softly.

He just responded with a roll of his eyes as he put his hand on the pointed out location and with concentration, disappeared.

The youngest daughter of Athena was right behind him, already ducking a huge club that a Cyclops was attempting to use to behead her.

"Huh?" the son of Hel asked even as he summoned his spear out of shadows and expanded to be as tall as the giant in front of him. The fire giant in front of him was a bit confused, as he looked at his blood covered axe, yet Dolph stood before him unharmed. "That bastard led us into a trap!"

"Dolph, can you handle these two?" his companion asked even as she drew deeply on her legend and her seething intellect, the new obelisk's touchstone right in front and lower down to her sight and senses.

"Yah, I got it." With that, the huge and quite scary Aesir tried his best to shove The Shovel right through the cyclops.

Between one blink and another, Sheila reappeared back in San Francisco as 'Martin' was still laughing.

"Wha-!" the heavy-set demigod said even as his 9mm glock was raised up in reaction, shooting the desperately dodging Sheila in the chest with cobra-like reflexes.

She grunted from the hit, but the armor had served her well, deflecting almost all of the attack even as the portly man tried to run. He wasn't terribly fast, really. At least compared to the young daughter of Athena. He was probably only hitting fifty miles per hour. Her 10mm silver pistol barked twice as she tried to lead him.

The scion of Hermes went flying, blood spraying across the wall as he spun through an arc in the air as a macabre tangle of arms and legs, coming to a halt forty feet away.

Bile tried to rise up in her throat, but she put that away as she trotted over quickly, grabbed the traitor and then was back at the obelisk and in another flicker clear back to New York City.

Her hurry had not really been needed, as Dolph was busy slicing up the fire giant with his spear even as it tried to scorch him over the smoking corpse of the cyclops.

"I- hate- fire!" the Aesir shouted as he slammed the huge spear into the giant, spurts of flaming blood spattering over the nearby tombstones. "Is he alive?"

"No," Sheila responded curtly even as she started to go through the man's pockets. Phone, ring, necklace and wallet were all quickly procured. She had forgotten to pick up his pistol, but wasn't sure if she could go and come fast enough. They also had the problem of the giants here. "Are you all right?"

"Just some light burns," the big Aesir replied with a crooked grin. "Wait, Eitre. We should take some of their heart blood, just in case."

The younger girl frowned at that, but finally nodded. "I supposed their might be a time where might is more important than intellect." The heart blood of a giant could bestow amazing strength, but at the cost of your mind and intelligence. Her small backpack had several sturdy vials that they used to quickly fill with the brackish red liquid.

And not a moment too soon, as the fire giant turned to ash. Dolph dumped the body of 'Martin' on the impromptu bonfire even as he used his spear to push the cyclops' corpse on top of the pile.

They stepped away while they considered matters.

"We should probably get back home before the cops show up. It'll probably end up being some sort of weird unsolved mystery-" Dolph was saying when his phone rang. "Yo."

He listened for a long moment, then turned to Sheila. "We can be there in about twenty to thirty minutes, I think." After a pause, he nodded and continued with, "We are already in New York. Right, bye." With that, he disconnected the call.

"What's going on?" the younger girl asked.

"She didn't say, just that it was big and involved the supernatural," Dolph replied.

The young girl nodded her blonde head. "I'd suggest that we not leave on the street level." Before she could offer to fly off with him, the big Aesir acted.

Dolph just grinned even as he crouched down. He then leaped over fifty feet through the air and to a nearby fifteen foot tall wall. Sheila was only a moment behind him.

The crunching sound of chips in the background was starting to annoy Janeka. She led the two others out of her private elevator and over to the expensive, solid-oak doors.

"I thought your friends were in San Francisco?" the disheveled Agent Walker said as she followed the stocky, short figure and Janeka into JSWare Inc.'s penthouse off of 8th Ave, overlooking Central Park.

The pock-marked dwarf seemed to stop and consider things. "That don't mean much." He let out a light belch, then reached for some more Doritos. His stubby little hands were quite dexterous at picking them out of the single-pack.

"Mr. Dougal, do you really need to eat that right now?" the special agent of the FBI asked in a controlled (not cross) manner.

"Hungry. Aephinus didn't feed me much. Heck, I'm surprised I'm still alive," the dwarf noted as he brushed the crumbs out of his ragged reddish beard. "An' I like Doritos." He started munching away.

Janeka led them into her private office even as she checked her phone to see if Dana or Tsukyo had replied. "Still got a no service message to Dana's phone." That could just be her being paranoid, making sure she couldn't be tracked.

So the young daughter of Ares only blinked a little bit at the sight of Sheila and Dolph appearing over the edge of her building and walking over to her sliding-glass window.

Walker frowned as she spotted the two bedraggled figures when they started to knock on the window. With a tap of a button her desk, the windows slid open and admitted them (and the high winds from the 45th floor.) "Did you two just run from San Francisco?"

"I take it they are like you?" the FBI agent asked.

"Nah, big guy's Aesir. He'll probably treat me slightly nicer than the fire giant did," Dougal said with a huff even as he hopped into a chair.

"Hmm. An actual Dwarf of Norse legend," Sheila noted. "I take the armed woman in a bad suit knows about the supernatural?"

"Dolph, Sheila; this is Special Agent Vanessa Walker with the FBI and Dougal. We just rescued Dougal from a fire giant that was holding him as a slave while he was smuggling u238 into the lower boroughs of New York City," Janeka explained.

"Two fire giants in one night? What did we do to deserve special attention?" Dolph asked with a bit of dark humor in his voice.

"More demigods of legend and myth?" Walker complained. "That's going to be a bitch to report."

"Someone was smuggling uranium into the United States? That doesn't make a whole lot of sense," the youngest scion said as she flopped into another plush, leather seat.

"That was her thought," Vanessa noted as she jerked her thumb at the young, black businesswoman.

"It's not like you can make a bomb and it needs to be enriched for anything useful. Well, unless they want to scare people by making a 'dirty' bomb that will slightly increase your chance of cancer," Janeka complained.

"But it's being moved by supernatural means." Sheila closed her eyes and tried to think hard. "Someone is building something supernatural that uses it. That guy that nearly killed me-"

"You think it's related?" Dolph cut in as he tried to think things through. "But what does high energy physics on the West Coast have to do with uranium coming in on the East Coast?"

"We don't seem to have enough information to actually say," the owner of the building said. "Dougal, you are free to stay here or my new place I'm setting up in San Francisco."

"Okay," the dwarf replied bluntly.

"I got the coolest thing. It's an actual Golden Servant of Heaphestus. I've got some big plans for a real workshop in San Francisco. Really put my brain to the test," Janeka said enthusiastically.

Sheila had noticed a white board with small, concise equations. "This is some of the physics from that lab at Berkley?"

"Yeah, it's really high falutin' math. Not something I've had to really mess with in a year or so," the black girl from Harlem said with a grin.

Dolph looked at it, feeling a bit surprised at how much he was actually understanding of the imposing calculation.

"Do you mind?" the younger girl asked.

"Mind? No," the daughter of Ares stated slowly.

So when green scribbles were started to be added at a rapid fire pace by the daughter of Athena, Janeka grabbed her own blue dry marker.

"Da hell?" Dougal exclaimed loudly. "What are they doing? That doesn't look like no magic language I know." The Dwarf looked a lot confused.

Agent Walker frowned as the two girls seemed to be writing a million miles an hour while arguing theorems and facts. "Does this happen often?"

"I think they are trying to prove who is smarter," the too-handsome Aesir noted in bemusement. "Man, I can barely follow what they are doing as they are hashing things out."

"So this would punch through the 11th dimension and start a collapse through the 10th to the 5th and end up at..." Sheila was saying even as she accidentally rubbed a bit of blue on her cheek.

"...3rd dimension but at a negative 4th dimensional transcendental state. Son of a bitch. It's time travel with only high energy requirements?" Janeka said, then whistled aloud.

"Well, maybe. If we can figure out the translation here and here. The bad thing is, we are just playing catch up. Someone is building this already."

The three Scions immediately realized that things were heating up.

Sheila stepped into the warehouse Janeka had purchased in South of Market, closing out the wet from the rain. Up in the rafters, a contraption of gold, bronze and copper was busy rebuilding the roof from the inside. The little Golden Servant was quite the industrious worker and seemed designed to be the perfect mechanical servant for invention-minded Scions.

"Hello?" she called out.

"Back here," Dolph called out. "Tsukyo and I are just fixing up the ground and drains here." The Son of Hel was busy putting concrete back into perfection by tracing the cracks with his finger, magically healing the damaged faux-stone.

"Hello darling! How's my favorite munchkin?" the Scion of Susan-o called out outrageously.

"I'm fine, thanks. I just brought some more samples for my lab." Lab was a bit grandiose of a term, but the work benches with microscopes, refrigerators and other bio-chemical devices was starting to shape up. She had some very interesting ideas about fixing things.

The door blew open again as Janeka arrived, her hands full of bags. "Yo, peoples! We got an emergency."

That got Sheila, Dolph and Tsukyo to trot over quickly.

"I got a couple of weird messages and decoded them. Dana has got herself up to her neck in troubles, vampire troubles of the gangster kind. Her little war on crime finally hired some supernatural muscle."

Tsukyo frowned as he went over it. "Vampires are tough, right?"

"Yes, they are supposed to be tough. So caution is definitely warranted," the youngest Scion said as she went over plans already.

"Gear up and let's get ready. I tracked her signal to a sewer system by the bay," Janeka said even as she pulled off her hoodie to start slipping on a heavier set of bullet-proof armor.

Dolph only had his heavy leathers which weren't even bullet proof, but he was very resistant to injury by himself. So he just slipped on a heavy long coat while Tsukyo put on a bullet proof vest. Sheila had her new armor which was lighter and sturdier than normal, imbued with some of her ichor. They all piled into Dolph's 'death-mobile' as he had added a fairly decent amount of armor.

"Not exactly low key though," Sheila noted as the big Aesir drove down the dark streets of San Francisco. Fog was drifting across

"We're demigods. We're supposed to have style," he replied with a feral smile. Inwardly he was looking forward to a battle.

Janeka's dark brown eyes were reading her modified computer's screen. She had several custom sensors plugged in. Tsukyo sat in the back of the cramped sports car, clenching his fists; each time it caused a creak that sounded rather imposing.

The black and silver Mustang was backed into an alley (quite illegally, but Dolph really didn't care) and the four demigods exited silently. The nearly seven foot tall Aesir picked up a heavy grate with one hand to let them all slip into the sewers.

"What an amazing smell you've discovered here, Princess," Janeka said in a faux-Han Solo voice.

"I would have been happy to never discover it," Sheila said as she accidentally played straight-man to the daughter of Ares' humor.

"We have got to get you to watch a few movies, darling," the Asian scion informed her with just a touch of exasperation.

She blinked at him, even as she carefully stepped on some stones to avoid walking in a puddle. "Oh. That again. Sorry."

Janeka had a pretty good idea of why her cousin was lacking in pop culture references and she did not like that. "Heads up. They are about sixty feet down and to the east under the wharf."

They all had dim red glow-rods that gave those that needed light just enough to proceed. That dim glow was suffused by flickering orange-red torches up ahead. Sheila slipped a small rod out that had a convex mirror on it and then scanned around the corner. "A Nosferatu. Those are only supposed to be in the Underworld. This could be really tough."

"Dolph, you go first as you are toughest," Janeka said softly as she readied her .454 caliber hand cannon.

The Aesir's visage had turned horrid even as his 'Shovel' appeared in his hand. He was still very quiet as he crept forward with the Scion of Susan-o at his back. Janeka looked around the corner, her eyes picking up heat and ultraviolet light. The vampire was a cold spot next to Dana who was chained down to a table.

Sheila had sent her senses ahead mystically and saw the smile upon the leering, horrid face even as Janeka realized that Dana's cell phone was in the monster's pocket.

"It's a trap," they both shouted even as they dashed around the corner behind Dolph and Tsukyo.

Dolph barely brought up his spear to block the flickering form of the superhuman undead as it clawed at him, staggering back three feet from the force of the attack. The Nosferatu appeared to be slightly _stronger_ than him, much to his surprise.

Cold, amber eyes took in the four demigods even as cracked, yellow teeth were uncovered by his leering smile. "Yes, this will be perfect. The Amazons are clear on the other side of the city chasing phantoms at the 'hunter's' bar while I can drain your souls to increase my power greatly." He casually blocked one punch from the martial artist, but Tsukyo's kick bounced off his ribs painfully. "You are rather dangerous in numbers, aren't you?"

"Ha! You haven't seen dangerous yet," the scion of Susan-o cat-called.

The Nosferatu just blurred forward even faster, snatching Tsukyo off the ground while dodging Dolph's spear that split the ground of the sewer chamber. Dolph was now well over eight feet tall and snarling at missing the lithe monster. "Stand still!" he bellowed even as he twirled the spear and ricocheted it off the ceiling to try and catch the vampire by surprise.

"Slow," the Nosferatu drawled even as he threw Tsukyo at the two girls who both leaped out of the way much, much faster than their male counterparts. His right hand claw ripped into Dolph's ribs in a spray of blood, but even the revealed bones and wound that would send lessers into shock merely made the Aesir more angry.

Janeka drew blood as Ares' Fury boomed while Sheila seemed to defy gravity for just a second as her feet touched the roof; concentrating and firing her own pistol carefully. The daughter of Ares's eyes widened for just a second before she shot again, though it also missed the vampire.

Tsukyo charged right back across the chamber, leap-kicking at the monster again while Dolph tried to knock him over with a knee to his face.

"I guess I must finish Dana off to have the power to truly defeat you," the vampire said, only to have his eyes widen in surprise as he realized that his victim was awake and free. Sheila and Janeka's shots had not missed, but shattered Dana's shackles even as the daughter of Athena had healed her greatest wounds.

The daughter of Artemis looked like she could murder the vampire with a pure glare of hatred alone, even as blackness encompassed her. The vampire missed his grab with grubby claws as the police woman seemed nearly invisible.

"Let's do this right. Let's scorch this sucker," Janeka called out, bolstering their will and valor. She slapped another clip into her pistol and moved closer, firing bursts of white-phosphorous.

"I've been meaning to try this ever since I did some research on those zombies!" the youngest scion called out as her feet tapped on the ground. She brandished her mother's amulet in her hand and ferociously channeled life's energies into the undead.

"Ack! It burns like the sun! You did not say you had a son of Apollo to fight against poor Kaleatheos!" the Nosferatu complained in black humor.

"One sunbeam, coming right up!" the Asian demigod called out as he channeled the power of the Sun from his hand, singing the vampire's shoulder. "Ha, I can do more than water stuff. So take that!"

Kaleatheos snarled even as he misstepped into the path of Dolph's Shovel so that it bit deep into his side, the arcane force of the Moon's tide disrupting his defense. Bullets from Sheila's gun slammed into his shoulder and face even as Tsukyo shattered an arm. Dana's silvery hand-scythe bit deeply into his back.

He was turning into a zombie-like horror, with divots of his flesh missing even as he tried to heal the horrific wounds. Janeka appeared in a dark blur in the nearly pitch black room actually putting her gun into the vampire's chest wound. Phospherous fire boomed inside the enclosed area, making his chest light up like a lamp and causing him to screech.

"Mine!" Dana shouted out, even as she caught the sickle around the vampires neck. She placed both feet on his back and pulled with every fiber of her hatred, every ounce of her legend and with a spray of black blood... decapitated the vampire.

Even after that, she kept slicing into his back in a furious frenzy.

Sheila's face was terribly pale as she saw her cousin in her berserk state. She turned to Janeka as she slipped her necklace off. "Try to heal her. I can't do any more right this moment."

"You sure? Of course you are," the black scion of Ares said. Using someone elses relic was supposed to be hard, but this was family. And her grandparents told you to be there for family. White teeth could be seen behind her lips as she grimaced in concentration, healing more of Dana's wound.

Dolph's appearance shifted back to his 'normal' appearance of super-model as he reached into a pocket and pulled out a jade symbol of Chinese healing. "Good idea. I, uh, borrowed this from a museum, so this is a good time to try it out." He also bent his legend, healing more of her wounds.

"Why didn't I think of that?" Tsukyo said. "I wonder if there are any other relics just laying around?"

The vampire had turned to dust, much to Dolph's glee.

"Ding, the boss is dead," Janeka said with a chuckle that caused Dolph and Tsukyo to laugh. "Yo, Dana! You safe to be around now? Or should we call one of your girl friends?"

Dark eyes glittered for a second, then Dana stood all the way up as she made her sickle disappear like a moonbeam under a cloud. "How about both?"

Sheila was still deciphering Janeka's different comments. She was pretty sure that the first one was some sort of pop culture reference. The second half got her to start blushing.

Oh, no. She was turning into _grandfather_ with these thoughts.

Chapter 8: Artifice and Craftiness

Dana only disappeared for a day or two before she caught up to the rest of the group at their 'base'. The warehouse was now mostly fixed up. Janeka had her robotics and computer lab, with things that were starting to advance years in just weeks. Already she was starting to work on a rapid-response combat robot, using things she learned from Hephaestus's golden servant and her first droid.

Dolph was more into rock and cars, it appeared. He had started to craft a disconcerting (but still pretty) pillar in veneration of his mother, Hel; the goddess of Death and Helheim. His Deathmobile was sitting heavy on the ground as he added supernaturally tough steel armor and glass to it.

Their mystic had settled a corner room as a magical workshop, trying to read into the future or hidden mysteries of the now. Dana could usually be found there with Samantha or Roxanne. Sheila was _starting_ to catch on that they only kissed when she was around to make her blush heavily.

Tsukyo was quite happy to just use any open area of the warehouse to dance. He had dreamed of being on Broadway and seeing his name up in lights. That didn't seem likely right now, but this was not going to last forever. Then he would shock them all and make his mother proud.

That left Sheila for last. She and Janeka had a slight rivalry going on, but for the most part the youngest scion was willing to expand into other areas while helping with everyone. She and Dolph talked over different ways to improve engines (and even help the world with super-efficient motor designs). For Tsukyo, she had helped set up some simple, colored spotlights that would follow him during his choreography.

Dana's magic was a lot outside of Sheila's normal expertise, but she learned a lot about the occult and ancient mythical history. Sheila was starting to be much smarter than the daughter of Artemis, but Dana was much, much more skilled so it all balanced out.

Between Sheila and Janeka though, they sometimes struck sparks. The two of them worked on the time-space equation. Though, that was mostly Janeka's baby. Other than that, Sheila helped tinker with some robots and they both tossed ideas for power armored exoskeletons. How to make them supernaturally tough and strong was eluding them right now. She was personally working on some bio-genetic tweaks to plants and animals.

Janeka _was_ starting to make some inroads on figuring out why Sheila seemed a bit clueless.

"That's not a light saber, Dougal!" the scion of Ares sniped at the dwarf.

The whoosh of the curved, flame saber and its flickering orange glow filled the main area of the warehouse. "It glows and it chops things up!" he shot back. "You are just jealous I made mine first." That was an annoying thing from Dougal, he could make something in _minutes_ if he had the tools, ichor and materials.

Sheila was just looking back and forth between the two, like a spectator at a tennis match.

"No, this is a light saber. Master Windu style even." Janeka pulled out the hilt of a Star Wars style light saber and activated the purple-ish energy blade.

"You are such a geek, Janeka," Dana said from where she was was going through a kata, lashing out with the extended length of her sickle and chain.

"I'm right though," Janeka called back. She suddenly turned on Sheila. "I mean, just like in Revenge of the Sith."

"Um, I guess?" Sheila vaguely recollected the glowing blades on her brother's game systems. "My brother had something like that on his PS3."

"Haven't you seen _any_ of the movies? Or any movies?" Janeka complained.

"No, movies rot your brains according to my foster parents," she replied with a shrug.

Dolph lifted up the car he was under (with only one hand and fairly effortlessly) to look at her in consternation. "What do you normally do to relax?"

"Math theories and philosophical debate essays. Why?"

All of the other scions shared a quick look, but it was the blunt as a hammer Dougal that spoke up. "Well shit, no wonder you have a stick up your ass all the time. You ain't lived at all." The little patches of stone that sunlight had burned on his face made him look like he had drops of acid poured on it. "Even I've seen movies."

Sheila was flushed scarlet by this point. "Well, I'm back to working on my Black Vines." She zipped over to her bio-laboratory in a blur.

She patted the ugly weeds as she checked their health. Sheila had been cheating slightly, magically purifying the seedlings which cured a lot of the genetic damage she was doing. She moved the next batch of plants into the air-tight glass cases and then filled them up with a concentration of smog of varying levels for each tank.

The fruit they would drop was a small, black berry that was filled with several heavy metals leeched from the ground and in a hard rind that gave off a smell that most animals hated. This could help save the planet, perhaps.

"It isn't right," Dolph said in an angry tone. "She isn't being allowed to be a kid."

"There are only two adults here, Dolph. Janeka and myself," Dana noted, her chocolate eyes giving him a challenging look.

"Tsukyo and I could be emancipated, especially since I turn eighteen in less than a month. She's only eleven years old, damnit," the Aesir said.

"She's just as much a demigoddess as the rest of us," Janeka replied. "Damn I wish it weren't true, but she fell into the deep end on her own and had to fight Lady Muerte-"

Dana suddenly snapped her fingers at that. "I just realized something. I had been doing a reading earlier, trying to verify where that bitch was going to strike next. And I just had a flash of insight. Tsukyo, you said she had not been there... but the time wasn't right. But tonight is the dark of the moon on her death anniversary."

"Ah shit. You mean we need to be in upstate New York in just three hours?" the scion of Ares complained.

The coal-black eyes of Lady Mary Muerte studied the Weston Cemetery of Canton, New York as the sun was setting. She stepped out of the black SUV, paid for by one of her zombies after she had murdered him. She put her hand on the ground and the dirt rippled as her undead slaves arose from the depths of the ground. They were dripping from the horrors of the Drowned Road. She touched the pouch at her hip, having the feeling she would need to summon her most powerful servants.

The grass was brown and drying and the trees looked almost dead. It was a dreary little cemetery, with a highway on one side and a natty copse of trees along the long strip. Muerte's scarlet and black dress made a soft rustle as she walked briskly at the head of her army of undead.

"Ya know, grave robbin's a serious sin," Janeka said as she stepped out of the shadows of a tree. "I think Tsukyo is righteously angry at you thinking about digging up his mother."

That halted Mary as she looked around, spotting the big Aesir. "So you brought your boyfriend along to get beaten up? I'm more powerful than before-"

"So are we, bitch. We're not just run of the mill heroes no more. What sort of demented plan requires digging up the dead?" the scion of Ares said, trying to give time for the rest of the group to get into position.

"A plan to shake the heavens themselves, daughter of Ares. Oh yes, I know you. Little lost girl who's mother died in childbirth because dear old dad couldn't keep it in his pants. And could not be bothered to sustain her life-force during her pregnancy. Did you know that in the last three thousand years, only three mortal mothers of demigods lived to an old age?" Ruby-red lips snarled in anger. "And the gods don't _care_. They screw them, then leave them to rot and die. And I won't stand for dat any more."

"Sounds like you have a chip on your shoulder the size of a Buick," Dolph nearly growled out angrily. "The dead should not be in the land of the living. You are messing with forces you don't understand."

"You think that because your mother is a goddess of death, the goddess of Helheim that she was not discarded like the rest? Odin _banished_ her to those cold halls and she detests it. I'm surprised she could even have a child. She's as smart as Loki and just a tricky. She just doesn't get caught. What horrors is she going to do to you? Or force you to do?" Mary said, stabbing her verbals barbs deep. She finished palming her statuettes. "Arise the scorned! Teach thy children the meaning that you always hurt the ones you love, Las Madres Muerte!"

Six shadows exploded from the little iron statues, hammered lovingly out of cold iron even as Sheila, Tsukyo and Dana sprung out of hiding.

Sheila skidded to a halt as their ambush was suddenly reversed. "Marcy Cartwright, I presume."

"My beautiful, deathly daughter. You stole my life just as surely as Zeus did when we rutted like animals on Mount Olympus," the beautiful shade said in a hissingly angry voice. "You failed to even keep my grave from being desecrated. You are such a failure."

The youngest scion felt the words strike deep and true as it seemed to magnify everything she had thought, but she also heard something that did no ring true. "This..." Her eyes narrowed in very, very deep thought. "This is a psychological trick to weaken our resolves. Guys, don't listen to their lies! They are just trying to make it easier to fight us!" This was her turn to lend legend and resolve to her words.

Janeka heard that and suddenly everything snapped into place. "Oh, you bitch. Those shades of our mothers, they don't have any free will any more, do they?"

Her mother seemed incensed at that, lashing out and nearly skewering the daughter of Ares, even as she blocked with her .454 casull's transmuted out a blade.

"Oh, hell yeah! A gunblade! Mary, I'm coming for you!" Janeka shouted out in anger and excitement. She was not making much headway, as the shade was fast and deadly with claws of midnight blackness.

But it was Dana that was absolutely furious. The tides of the moon seemed to shake the very Earth as she started to cut her way through the shade of her starlet mother to get to Lady Mary Muerte. Tsukyo was at her side, the cracks of thunder exploding zombies with his inhumanly skillful karate.

Mary's pouty lips dropped open in shock as she realized that they _weren__'__t_ heroes any more, but demigods coming into their own power. She had her dagger out, but was even now looking for someplace where she could disappear to. "That should not be possible! You were only awakened to our godly parentage only a few short weeks ago! It took me _decades_ to become a demigoddess!"

"Darling, we are just that good," the scion of Susan-o said in dark humor even as he kicked a zombie up so hard it was stuck in a tree thirty feet away.

"Or you just suck," Janeka noted coldly.

Sheila had filed that fact away, noting it mostly fit what she had heard. Most scions languished as heroes for years if not decades. Their meteoric ascension boded for a _very_ exciting future.

"You are not going to keep me from my revenge of Baron Samedei!" Mary snarled out. "He will be the sacrifice that burns all gods to ash, even in their heavens!" She winced as a few bullets started to strike home, actually drawing blood this time. "Damn you! Your souls will be mine!"

"No, they won't," Dolph declared. "We are catching up to you fast in power. Together, we already match you and your servants." The Shovel slammed home on two different zombies, smashing them to mangled bits. "You're just a two-bit villainess."

Over half of her zombies were dead and none of the demigods in front of her were wounded yet. Dolph had shrugged off the occasional punch or claw like he could not feel them and the rest... her zombies could not even _touch_ them.

It was a cold knot of fear that made her run.

"Oh, that's how she is doing that. She can shadow step," Dana said as their foe took off.

"I can probably catch her," Sheila called out.

"No, she's running and she won't stop. Dolph and Tsukyo couldn't even hope to keep up. And we don't want her drawing us into an ambush. We'll clean her clock later." Janeka made a very disgusted face. "Now we get to rob your Ma's grave ourselves, Tsukyo."

"We aren't planning on turning her into a ghost, so I think she would understand," he said a sober tone that was quite unlike the somewhat flighty young man.

Chapter 9: Hymns of War

Janeka opened the door to her old brownstone in Harlem. "Guys, don't worry. My Grandpa and Grandma are good people. They'll love to meet you. Gramps, Grandma, I'm home!"

Sheila followed Tsukyo, Dana and Dolph into the very homey (and a bit cramped) condo. She suppressed the desire to sigh as Janeka's grandfather fussed with her even as the grandmother called out that she was baking cookies.

"No problem, Grandma. We're just stopping by for a visit," Janeka called out with a very happy smile on her face. "I don't get to see you nearly enough, you know."

Dolph had a small frown, while Dana and Tsukyo had slightly wistful smiles on their faces as they missed their own family. Sheila, though, had schooled her face to passive implacability. It was obvious that this is how _families_ were supposed to be. Really, it appeared she only had a slightly normal relationship with her brother, tainted by her jealousy.

She could easily see running away to join the navy at seventeen. It would have been intolerable to live in the same house. Her keen blue-green eyes noted boxes full of papers alongside the left stairs, making them much more narrow. It appeared that the scion of Ares had bought the other half of the building and turned it into some sort of office.

"So this is the original home of JWS, Inc?" the youngest Scion asked casually.

"Ayup. I made my first million dollars writing Sure-Tech Security for the US Army," Janeka said happily. "My folks don't wanna move at all, so I just bought the neighbors out."

Dolph nodded his head. "What are you worth these days?"

"Couple a hundred million, I think. I let the accountants keep track of that closely. I just work on my investments," the dark-skinned demigoddess said.

"I'm only worth a few million and I have to get my family's lawyers to sign off on everything," Sheila complained as she flopped down on an old, comfortable couch. "That new piston design has the big three auto makers very interested though. That will make Dolph and I some serious money."

"Man, I feel like I'm the only one not making any headway there," Tsukyo complained.

"You don't hear me complaining about not making tons of money off of inventions," the daughter of Artemis noted dryly.

Grandpa White had the TV turned on, watching a game. It was obvious that Janeka really didn't care one way or the other for the football game, but she was willing to hang out in the cramped living room. Grandma White had dropped by with fresh popcorn just in time for Dolph to suddenly start in on yelling at the center line.

"Bunch of pansies! I could have made that tackle in half that distance. Before I got, uh, bigger," Dolph said, looking over at Janeka's grandfather in consternation.

"You mean before you found out you were a demigod," the old black man said with a crooked smile. "We might be good Christians, but even we couldn't ignore that she was doing some super-human things."

"It was a bit ugly." Janeka lowered her voice a bit. "Grandma didn't like it at all."

"She thought it was just vindication that her daughter died because of her sins, something I do not agree with at all, girl. I love your grandmother dearly, but she is a bit stuck in her ways." The old man looked much older, suddenly.

"Man, that sucks," Tsukyo noted softly.

That was when Grandmother White came in. "The first cookies are for you, Pa. Then Janeka can get her greedy paws on them," she said with a slightly forced smile that Sheila, Dana and Janeka all picked up a bit. She must have overheard them.

They both had the cookies on the top of the pile, while Dolph was the first non-White to actually taste the cookies.

"These are good," he said while mumbling over the crumbs."Kind of different."

Janeka frowned, as the cookies tasted perfectly fine. "Just a sugar cookie."

Dana sniffed at her's for a second even as Sheila took a small nibble.

"Poison!" they both cried out.

"Oh, is that what that was?" Dolph asked as his stomach gurgled slightly.

"Die heathens for your sins against the lord!" the grandmother shouted, eyes wild in fanatic zeal as she pulled a knife out from her pocket and stabbed into Tsukyo.

"Hey, I didn't say your cookies sucked," the Asian-American said as he deflected most of the attack, leaving on a small line of blood on his hand.

"Shit! Don't hurt her!" Janeka shouted out, trying to beat Dolph to grabbing her. She grabbed the knife and twisted it out of the old woman's hands even as Dolph tried to fend off a stab in direction that clinked off his stone hard skin.

Dana had grabbed one arm, twisted and had the old woman down on the ground with textbook precision on a police-style take down.

"The Lord will strike you down! He is the only God!" the old woman shrieked.

"Someone knock her out!" Dana shouted right back.

"Not drugged, but her eyes are heavily dilated," the youngest girl noted. She started to jab her fingers into the old woman's nerve-junctions and quickly knocking her out.

"Ooh. Vulcan nerve pinch. I didn't think that was real," Tsukyo said with a broad smile.

"Um, Vulcan would use a hammer to lay someone out," the daughter of Athena noted in confusion.

"Girl, we have got to get you to watch some TV at times," Janeka said even as she turned to the man who raised her. "Do you have any idea what sent her over the edge, Pa?"

The old, bald black man looked away for a second. Then he nodded. "I figure that the reverend may have been saying something, but I had no idea he had such evil in his heart to turn your Ma against the girl we raised."

"Reverend Samuel? Tie her up. We're gonna have some words with a priest." Janeka looked ready to murder someone.

"Uh, can it wait until my stomach stops hurting?" Tsukyo asked.

Sheila purged the poison from Tsukyo instantly. "I missed that you had eaten a cookie. Sorry, Tsukyo." She looked at the big Aesir in confusion.

Dolph's belch caught them all by surprise. He had the sense to look apologetic.

"Um, he's not poisoned at all. I mean, its not even in his system," the young daughter of Athena noted in surprise.

"Oh, um, well Dougal and I have been sort of practicing eating metals and such. He says its useful for figuring out how to craft them better."

"Neat trick. But it's time for another neat trick called making the priest talk." Janeka patted her grandmother on the shoulder. "Hang on, Nana."

The demigods had checked out the small office in the back the protestant church, discovering ancient scrolls hidden in a chest.

"These deal with the cult of Aten and his earthly servants," Dana said, even as Sheila read over her shoulder. "This is some serious magical power here."

"This scroll has been opened the most. A summoning ritual to bring an 'angel' here," the youngest demigoddess noted.

"Shit, that could be bad," Janeka realized. "Any angel is a singular power, rivaling many weaker gods."

"Well, so do we," Dolph noted. "We're demigods now."

"So we should prepare for a big fight?" Tsukyo asked as his fingertips caressed the simple cotton belt that held his pants up. Already, the spirit of fighting was awakening. He would do the same with his slippers and his jacket, amplifying his skills of athleticism and awareness.

"Let's do this," Janeka ordered.

They trooped around to the main entrance that the young Scion of Ares slammed open, her fingers itching for her gun. "Reverend Samuels!"

The priest looked totally unworried. "And so the unholy enter the house of the lord." He was standing in a pool of white light just behind an alter. "Heathens and heretics! Blasphemers all! You shall be judged!" His voice dropped low, in a menacing matter already. "And found unworthy of basking in his holy light."

The light suddenly grew to impossible brightness through the stained-glass window above the alter. That window shattered as a being of radiant light appeared on wings of sunlight.

Dolph cried out as the light burned his retina while Tsukyo merely glared harder, his own powers of the sun protecting him.

"I'm blinded," Sheila complained even as she adapted her clairvoyance to replace her eyes, "but I am fine."

"Need to make some flash-protection goggles," Janeka grumbled even as she pulled out her .454 casull and fired, the bullet actually bouncing off the seeming perfection of the luminous angel.

Tsukyo grimaced, trying to overcome a sense of enforced awe. "W-What is going on?" as everyone else pulled out weapons.

"He might be more powerful than us, but he can't defeat us all," Sheila called out, amplifying the innate heroism of valor within them all.

The scion of Susan-o nodded as he felt the power weaken... then shatter!

Darkness had gathered around Dana as she then followed Tsukyo in to melee. The angel actually let out a small sound of discomfort as Tsukyo's punch hit his solar plexus.

"Take that, blinkie!" the young scion of Susan-o called out excitedly.

The angel seemed angered by his effort, blasting him with scorching white light that burned the young teen-idol demigod. It actually gave out a real cry of pain as the moonsilver scythe bit deep as two bullets stuck him dead center, but the attacks left only bruised flesh. He was quite uncowed by the attack.

"There you go, Dolph!" Sheila called out as she cured the Aesir's blinded eyes. They needed their all to defeat this

"Thanks!" he yelled out even as he charged forward. The Shovel skipped on the ground and he flowed in a massive sweep that the angel of the Titan of Light avoided by the merest hairbreadth. "Dammit!" He should have grown bigger.

Janeka's cannon fired again and again, leaving small bruises.

"You can not defeat the light! Darkness burns at the greatness of God!" the priest continued to shout. He had his cross out, waving it like it would do something.

The Shovel came whistling down with the power of a small building collapsing, only to bounce heavily off of alabaster skin, leaving another ugly purple bruise.

"Now," Sheila muttered, twisting her healing power to magnify the bruises across the angel's body and wings, causing cuts and gouges to appear.

"This should not be possible," the angel exclaimed. "You should not even be able to withstand my radiance! The Light should protect me from your uncouth weapons!"

Janeka was channeling all of her righteous anger and aim into one perfect moment. "Yippie-ki-yay, mother fucker!" The Fury of Ares thundered, spraying angelic ichor upon the the wall in a large gout.

"Die for the righteous!" the angel managed to scream out, spitting blood.

With a massive, titanic burst of light, the angel exploded with the force of nearly a ton of dynamite. Reverend Samuels was instantly shredded.

Dolph grunted in pain, but his incredible physique was only lightly bruised after the attack. Dana and Tsukyo were not quite so tough and had been smashed through several pews of the church.

"They're alive!" Sheila shouted even as she zipped over to the more heavily wounded Asian-American. "Come on." With a burst of healing power (that felt much more natural and good than her injuring power from earlier) she turned almost all the worst of his wounds to mere bruises and scrapes.

Sirens wailed in the distance, even as Sheila healed the worst injuries of Dana, though her left arm was still broken. Both of them were still moderately dazed and were not able to move quickly.

"Did anyone get the number of that jumbo jet?" the daughter of Artemis snarked woozily.

"We need to get the hell out of here. Otherwise we are going to get to see what the interior of the Department of Homeland Security looks like from inside one of their interrogation cells," Janeka called out.

"I'll meet you two at Janeka's home," Sheila called out, even as she picked up the two injured people quite easily.

"Got it," Dolph called out. He watched the youngest girl fly on winds out the ruined roof of the church, then crouched and with a massive 'thoom' noise, leaped through it himself.

Janeka was only a moment behind him, even if her leap was not quite as impressive in distance. But with her incredible dexterity and immunity to fire, it was relatively easy for her to follow them across the roofs.

Janeka slammed the door to the warehouse, causing the other demigods to drop what they were doing and reach for weapons. "Relax, people. Just venting. Gramps is taking Grandma into a specialist that can deprogram her. I've just had my fill of cops. Seems like someone saw us enter the church, but only recognized me. So I've been playing innocent to good-cop/bad-cop all afternoon. Thank god (even Ares) for the fact we use touchstones these days and that I had a meeting with Special Agent Walker a before I came over yesterday. No plane tickets and the cops don't have much of a case for terrorism."

"Daaaamn, girl. You are just having some bad luck." Tsukyo couldn't help but shake his head in commiseration.

"Aten is dead. I'll erase him from history and kill all of his servants. This is personal now," the black daughter of Ares said heatedly, bile filling her words.

Dana felt something more than the rest. "I'm with you, one-hundred percent. You are family."

"Got that right," Dolph said in agreement.

Sheila found herself nodding, though she seemed to find herself not quite as intent on Aten's destruction as most of the others. And that worried her.

Could she not feel something so intense like that furious anger from the others?


	4. Times of Turmoil

**Chapter 10: Happy Holiday Mayhem to You!**

Dougal was whistling some awful tune in a very off-key manner. Missing a front tooth hurt his ability there a lot. He wandered over to where his sometime drinking buddy was tinkering on his Mustang again. "Yo," he called out. "I got those door-panels you wanted."

The big Aesir peeked out from under the hood. "Great. With that, I can make it so we can all easily fit in my car. I even UV blocked the windows especially for you."

"I guess Janeka and Sheila is working on some sort of anti-sunlight suit too," the dwarf said doubtfully.

"They like you," Dolph said as he patted the dwarve's back.

"Well, except when I leave Cheetos crumbs out. Or make something twice as fast as they can." Dougal looked a bit sheepish at that. He had to admit that this was one Aesir that he didn't mind. Most of the rest were right bastards, only wanting the dwarves to craft for them. But Dolph seemed to _like_ forging things himself. So it was a novel experience crafting _with_ an Aesir.

The door to the warehouse kicked open as the other scions made their presence known.

"Knock knock, birthday boy!" Janeka called out raucously. Behind her were Tsukyo, Sheila and Dana, all burdened with presents. The two Amazons, Samantha and Roxanne, were following behind looking bemused.

"Just because you aren't as strong as us doesn't mean we have to carry all the presents," Sheila grumbled under a pile as large as Dana's.

The dark-eyed daughter of Artemis just rolled her eyes. "Come on, it will be fun."

The big and supernaturally handsome Aesir was looking a bit confused. "I thought you guys were all going to be out of town with family for the week?" Christmas was only a few days away.

"Eh, I couldn't visit late while my grandparents are with the deprogrammers. So I didn't have anything better to do. I did finally convince my Grandpa to move out of the city. So I'm buying him a nice home in Alabama," the black teen said with a too wide grin.

"My old man is running a bar. Even with the night off, he won't be expecting to see me until about one o'clock," Dana noted while grinning.

"We're here with her, of course," Samantha said. "I brought the mistletoe!"

"Can anyone talk to it to promise to not hurt us?" Sheila asked a bit too innocently. "Are you going to summon up your Einherjar? I'm pretty sure I heard some bottles of beer in the grocery bag."

"Sure, why not." Dolph spun the Shovel, it's broad head covered in glowing runes, to slam down upon the ground. His five undead servants, gifts from dread Hel, arose through the concrete like it was merely water.

Sigurd looked around first. "A party?"

Fritz smiled, quite ghastly looking under his Nazi army helmet. "A different sort of mayhem, eh?"

That got all the Einherjar chuckling, even as the two Amazons started to set out the refreshments. Sheila had remembered Dougal's two favorite flavors of Doritos _and_ his Cheetos, much to his delight. Dolph had grabbed a beer, muttering that it tasted better than the water (or soda that Janeka had made sure to grab.)

Sheila was drinking her bottled, flavored water when Dana, Janeka and herself all suddenly looked towards the main street. Was something else going on out there?

So they were the only ones not totally surprised when a lightning bolt blasted right through the north wall, swept through the eastern wall and then out the southern wall like some demented lightning gun.

"We're under attack!" Dana shouted, even as she punched a falling piece of the roof just before it could hit Samantha's head.

Dolph took a lightweight I-beam to his head, watching in bemusement as it bounced. Tsukyo had managed to react _just_ in time, so had joined Janeka and Sheila in dancing between the falling debris.

_"__Retribution__has__arrive__, __Children__of__the__Betrayers__,"_ a booming voice called out in Ancient Atlantean. His skin was charcoal black and he wore armored sleeves and a helm that did not hide his lower face. A muzzled-face that was full of tusks and fangs with glowing blue eyes within the shadows of its helm.

Dougal just looked up at the fifty foot tall man-like being standing at the eastern wall. "What in the Nine Realms is that?" He was holding his left arm that had been broken when he used it to stop some debris from braining him.

"Assassins," Janeka shouted even as she spun and fired as a bare-chest Atlantean that had a gleaming black sword in his hand charged at her from the shadows.

_"__Attans__, __attack__!"_ the leader ordered. The Atlantean assassins wore black jewelry, arms and leg guards along with fearsome animal head-dresses. _"__Baduras__wants__us__to__bath__in__their__blood__!"_

Dana just barely avoided the giant's metal club that turned to lightning as he swung, her glittering scythe deflecting two swords that sought her blood. Roxanne was not quite so lucky, but her bullet proof vest saved her life even as she spun from a cut that left a foot long cut in her chest across a breast.

Sheila and Janeka were firing as fast as they could in a controlled manner at the assassins, even as they leaped and twisted around the lightning bolt club that snapped through the air. Tsukyo snatched one of the Attans and tossed it in the way of the giant club even as Dolph snarled in fury as he grew to an astounding ten and a half foot tall.

"Man, being this much smaller than him sucks," the Aesir complained even as he finished pulling out his spear. He moved to block the downswing of the club, only for it to swerve to the side, bounce off the shattering concrete and then thunder into the side of his chest with the power of a thunderbolt. That caused him to roar in anger and pain.

The youngest scion frowned as she zoomed into the air on the wind, her bullets smashing into the demon's chest, but not to any great affect. She had the impression she would need a great deal larger caliber weapon to really hurt it. But it was out of the corner of her eye that she saw several things.

A bare-chested Asian with writhing Yakuza-style tatoos was over looking the area from a building about seven hundred feet away and two police cars and their officers looking away from the newly arrested convenience store robbers they had just apprehended only two blocks away. "This... is going to be messy," she muttered even as she dodged the giant's lighting-club, feeling her hair stand on end. "Guys, I'm going after the mastermind from Nazca!"

Kane Taoka frowned as the youngest scion appeared next to him. "Foolish girl. You attack your betters quite brazenly." He pulled out his katana, even as the black dragon tattoo upon his chest roared and then lashed out at her, smashing the air conditioner behind her. "Think quickly, girl. Are you a heroine?"

With that, the serpentine shadow dragon roared as it flew off at a fast slither, right towards the cops. One of the cops had the will to actually fire upon it as it rushed down.

The young girl gave the Scion of the Amatsukami a venomous glare, then rocketed off.

Cpl. Reggie Toyle was staring death in the face when a girl appeared next to him, picked up his patrol car by the bumper and intercepted the dragon of shadow with a crunch. He took a quick shot that _bounced_ directly off of its' forehead.

"That gun is too small of a caliber! Let me handle it," the thin, tall teen said as she grunted in effort to push the dragon back. She was losing the contest of strength, as the dragon was much larger and a bit stronger.

Back down the street, flickers of silver and the cracks of bullets sent the giant demon staggering back even as a eleven foot tall Aesir climbed his much larger adversary like it was just a tree.

"Holy shit, this is real!" a thirty year old woman said, even as her eleven year old son was busy holding up his phone and taking pictures. She grabbed the boy and dragged him around the corner of the C-Store while the dragon finished shredding the cop car.

The young demigoddess leaped over the snapping snout of the dragon even as she channeled the distilled essence of war into the loaded bullet of Athena's Wit. She side-stepped and spun, the gun held perfectly down her left side and fired. It's inimical power blew a six inch whole right through the neck of the dragon that weeped nocturne ichor. The wound started to close slowly.

All six cops were now firing, mostly just aggravating the dragon. With a snarl, it lunged forward at the thin girl, who dropped backwards on her free hand and then flipped herself along the ground in a spin that ended right back on her feet with impossible poise. She gathered even more power to imbue into her gun's next two bullets. Crack-crack she went, causing a pained shriek as the oriental shadow-dragon realized he was in real danger of being killed. It streaked down the road to try to escape, heading towards an alley.

The daughter of Athena was only a moment behind him, passing the dragon in spite of his supernatural gait. The dragon had a moment to look surprised before she fired a final bullet into its head.

It started to dissipate immediately, melting away like shadows under the rising sun. In another blur, she appeared back at the cops. A quick glance showed her that her friends were still fighting. "Everyone here all right?"

"We're fine! Back up is on the way," the oldest cop called out.

* * *

><p>Dolph was busy stabbing the gray-skinned demon as he held on tenaciously from its left shoulder-plate with one arm. Dana and Tsukyo were leaping from the nearby buildings to stab or punch it in some of its vitals while the boom of Janeka's, the Einherjar's, and the Amazon's guns kept up a steady amount of damage. It seemed to be healing just slightly slower than the damage that was coming in.<p>

Dana's dark eyes, hooded under her shadow-mask, could see in the darkness as easily as anyone could under the noon sun spotted something high up in the sky. "Dolph, Tsukyo! Duck and cover!" she called out as she leaped away to bounce off the building across the street.

Both of the demigods trusted her, so moved quickly away just before a sonic boom hit the area. A V6 engine (infused with the inimical glowing red essence of war) struck the demon's shoulder in a rending attack that crippled him and sent him staggering to one knee from the super-sonic attack. Sheila skidded to a stop as she slid across the ground after an abrupt eighty degree turn.

"Huh, not just uselessly distracted after all," Janeka muttered slightly. "All right, people! All together! Let's finish him off!"

Dolph and Tsukyo knocked his remaining arm out from under him even as Dana with her Amazon sliced into the demon's chest. He was already gurgling as his obsidian bile leaked from fatal wounds, but Sheila and Janeka's bullets finished him off.

* * *

><p>The front page of the San Francisco Chronicle had a very nice picture of Sheila holding a cop car with one hand as the shadow dragon bit and clawed into it.<p>

"Wow, that's freaking really cool," Anton said as he looked over the picture.

Erwin had the news on at the breakfast table, where pictures and short cell-phone videos were plastered in snippets on the local news. "Well, I don't think I've ever heard of any modern demigods going quite so public," the lawyer noted dryly.

Lisa had a fairly severe frown on her face. "Is this going to be a problem?" she asked her adopted daughter.

"Not that I'm aware of," Sheila replied even as she finished several emails to her investment company with a carbon copy to her lawyer. "I mean, it's not like being publicly known for this is going to stop the monsters from attacking. It certainly didn't stop that demon last night."

That was when her charging smart phone rang with Janeka's ring tone.

"This is Sheila."

"Yo. Get dressed up in something nice. If we are going to be plastered on the front page, we might as well let our _adoring_ public know the truth. 'sides, I got nothing to hide. I'll be by to pick you up in about two hours. Okay?" the daughter of Ares said. You could hear the smile in her voice.

"We're going to be holding a _press_ conference?" Sheila deduced incredulously.

"Ayup. See you later."

The young demigoddess just stared at her phone in consternation. "I, uh, guess we are going to have a press conference."

"My friends are going to be sooo jealous." Anton looked like it too.

Sheila actually put some thought into her outfit. She was not going to wear a skirt or dress, so dug out a pair of dark slacks with a white blouse. She added a suit jacket and sturdy boots. She was, of course, wearing her armor under the outfit which actually made her look a little heavier.

Two hours later, Sheila stepped out the front door and avoiding a few of the neighbors as she slid into the passenger side seat of Janeka's Cadillac. It was actually a fairly short drive to Janeka's office over at the Union Square.

"All these people are here for us?" the blonde said, feeling a bit intimidated. The square around the central obelisk was absolutely packed.

"Yo, girl, push us through this, would you? You are taller. Move it. Coming through," Janeka called out.

Sheila realized it was quite true. She was actually more than two inches taller, which she had picked up the fact that it frustrated the older teen. "Please move. Coming through." Then started to use just a bit of her strength and a fair bit of her too agile hands. She actually stopped two men from picking her pocket.

Dolph, Tsukyo and Dana were already there, giving some fans that were chanting DC against some other fans that were shouting Marvel some very odd looks.

"Heya, kiddo!" Dolph called out. He was dressed in his leathers and had put on a black shirt with the jacket over it.

Tsukyo was dressed fairly snazzy in an impeccable three-piece suit while Dana looked quite uncomfortable in her own sweater and slacks. Although it was more likely that she was about to be outed as a super-human cop.

The mayor had shown up and was giving the five demigods side-long looks, like he couldn't just figure things out quite yet. He did take a moment to shake their hands cordially. "So, ladies and gentlemen, are you ready? I'm just here to over see this fairly dramatic time."

"What the-!" Dana said, looking up.

"Tada! The life of the party is here!" winged man said as he landed right next to them. "Donny Rhodes, scion of the ever radiant Aphrodite has arrived." He was wearing a very expensive white silk... leisure suit? His short blond hair was impeccably coiffed and he actually had just a hint of makeup on. His wings (which worked and functioned and looked like) were attached to a harness he wore impeccably over his suit.

"Is it a god-damned male thing to be ten times prettier than us gals here?" Janeka asked bluntly. All three men were staggeringly handsome. The daughter of Ares was incredibly plain in comparison.

Dana and Sheila both actually were prettier than most supermodels, but compared to Dolph, Tsukyo, and the new arrival, they still almost looked plain themselves.

Donny just looked at her with a shit-eating grin. "I guess it is today."

"Um, nice to meet you, Mr. Rhodes. I'm Laura Givens. Let me introduce you and then I'll turn over the mike to you." The news anchor gave them a quick smile and stepped up to start speaking to the crowd. "Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for coming here on such short notice. Obviously we are all here to learn about these amazing, superhuman individuals."

The crowd actually roared out, drowning her voice.

"And without further adieu, here is Janeka White." The news reporter stepped back.

Janeka actually stood up and tilted the microphones down a little bit. "I'm not exactly sure why _I_ got picked to speak. Like the nice reporter said, my name is Janeka White and I am a demigoddess. The daughter of Ares more specifically. While that gives us some cool powers, it also comes with the hefty penalty of the enmity of our parents foes. Strangely, I think dear old dad managed to piss off quite a few people."

That got a laugh as Janeka played the crowd with a silver tongue.

"But yeah, demigods exist. Not a mutant, not an alien-" she was saying to the crowds and the panoply of cameras to the whole world.

A window shattered as an antitank missile was fired from inside a building five hundred feet away. It managed to surprise all of them, even those with incredibly keen senses as they had not been expecting such an outrageous attack. Dolph actually did not even see it until it hit him dead in the chest as he was in the center of the ground and the back. The three demigoddesses had reacted with incredible reflexes to the unexpected attack, each leaping away to the extent of their abilities. Dana and Sheila jumped more than one hundred feet straight up while Janeka actually dived forward on the edge of the attack.

The explosion was massive, killing the mayor instantly. Linda Givens was bleeding to death even as Dolph looked around in shock. He himself had been unaffected, as reality had again hiccuped when he hadn't noticed the incoming attack. Tsukyo and Donny had actually imbued their skin with a strange bit of legend, shedding their skin even as they were blasted with lethal force. They ended up at the edge of the crowd looking only a little mussed from their clothing being shredded.

Sheila landed on the crater even as she reached for her amulet that carried the focus of her legendary healing ability. She split her focus between Linda and another victim on the edge of the explosion. "Dolph! Dana!" she called out, letting her frustration show.

Both of them pulled out their purloined relics. Dana had her little Atlantean statue while Dolph had his Chinese amulet. Even as they started their best to heal, Janeka was dashing across the heads of the crowd, covering the five hundred feet in just 1.1 seconds, leaping up into the room where the rocket had been fired from. Tsukyo and Donny were right behind her, thought it took them almost ten seconds to cover the distance.

All in all, they saved everyone but the mayor who had been far too close to the anti-armor weapon explosion. The frothing Christian Fundamentalist had been arrested, shouting the glories of god and death threats to all heretics. On CNN live, no less.

* * *

><p>Sheila just glared at her younger step-sibling. "It was not fun. I nearly got blown up." She was back home at their small home. Her parents had been happy to find she was fine and then had said she looked very nice on TV, even if she had not had the chance to speak to the public.<p>

A brand new reality news show was airing on the large TV in the living room. Linda Givens was anchoring the new show which was called Scion Watch, extolling the virtues of the heroes that had saved her life and asking for people to call in to a hotline with tips about the supernatural. Her phones had been ringing off the hook non-stop.

"But you looked so cool as you out jumped the explosion. It was like something right out of the movies, but more real," Anton babbled on loudly. "My friends think I'm the coolest kid on the block and we've got news reporters camped outside-"

Ding-dong went the doorbell again. Their mother headed to it quickly, muttering under her breath some very vile curses. She had not liked this sort of attention. So when she looked through the peakhole, her frown only got more serious. She unchained the heavy lock and deadbolt and then slid the door open.

"Can I help you officer?" she asked the two uniformed brown and gold San Francisco PD on her doorstep. "Please, come in."

Sargent Rubin Brown did not look happy to be here at all. "I'm afraid ma'am-"

"Sargent, just arrest her," the man in the suit behind him ordered. "We'll get this sorted out at the police station."

That was when Erwin showed up, taking in the suits and officers at the front door. "And what are we being arrested for?"

"Endangerment of a minor, child abuse, abandonment to start with. I can't believe that any parent would let their eleven year old daughter run around with illegal weapons to fight monsters," Jack Northrup said with a smarmy smile on his face. "As the Attorney General of California, it's my duty to make sure such a high profile case-"

"-gets you elected later on," Sheila cut in bluntly. "My parents don't have a choice in this. They were given a mandate by their goddess to raise me, but things got off the rails as something _bad_ is going on. They are having to let me make my own way because they can not protect me from the monsters."

"That isn't for you to decide, little girl. Cuff her if she resists," he said with a sneer.

"So exactly where are you taking me for my 'protection'?" Sheila asked. "And how are they going to handle the zombies, vampires, assassins, giants and demons? Or are you going to put all those normal children and adults into danger trying to protect me from things you don't fully understand?"

The man from Child Services frowned at that. "My name is Matthew Warren. I'm sure if we keep you out of the limelight, you won't get attacked," he said in a tone that attempted to be reassuring, but really came across as condescending.

"You do realize the last time someone tried to 'protect me' by sending me on a wild goose chase I ended up fighting a demigoddess of death and murder _along_ with her dozen zombie followers? I mean, Sergeant Brown was the responding officer. Janeka and the band actually showed up five minutes after him and his new partner."

Warren frowned at that. He was a very plain man who was under an awful lot of pressure right this moment. "Officer, is what she said true?"

"Yeah, we arrived to find her fighting off undead at a cemetery," Brown said as he tilted back his hat off of his dark brow.

"And last night? We were showing up to Dolph's eighteenth surprise birthday party. If you put me with normal people, you are just painting a target on them. I've been spending more and more time at our warehouse just for that reason." Sheila's eyes were hard and cold. "They aren't strong enough to pick up a car or fast enough to outrun the wind nor smarter than any mortal I've met."

"And we're not going anywhere," Erwin said as he slipped back around the corner. "The phone is for you, Mr. Northrup. It's the governor."

Jack Northrup's face had a priceless look of total surprise as he took the cordless phone. "What the hell did you do? Sergeant, I told you to arrest that man. What the fucking hell are you doing?"

"Mr. Northrup, I think I need to call my captain before we proceed. I'm not sure we are taking the right steps here," Rubin said carefully. He reached up for his radio, calling in to the station.

That was when Dana pulled up in her car. "Hey, Sheila? What's going on?" Flashes from the photographers and cameras were beneath her notice.

"The Attorney General showed up to supervise arresting my parents to bolster his image. I'm sure it's a re-election image thing. I thought we were going to meet tomorrow?"

"Something bad came up. If we don't get to the River of the Dead and to Atlantis, the world might end. We're meeting at Janeka's place. Need a lift?" she asked with a grin.

"No, I think it's time for an object lesson." The winds swirled around Sheila even as her hair glinted brightly in the sunlight. With a woosh, she rocketed into the air faster than most airplanes traveled.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 11: A Ride into the Eternal Night<strong>

"You know, just appearing in other countries is probably bound to upset someone," Tsukyo noted as the band of demigods appeared at a ruin in Egypt.

"We don't have time for that. Dana's prophecy really did state that if we didn't stop the Mirror of Alnottis, the Atlantean gods were going to be freed _soon_," the darkest-skinned demigoddess stated. In the bright light, she almost looked like obsidian.

"You know, some of us did not get to hear that..." Sheila drawled out.

_"__As__the__Barrier__within__Death__cracks__and__breaks__; __unbound__come__the__prodigal__child__of__the__gods__and__Titans__. __Out__of__Frost__and__Ice__comes__the__armies__that__must__not__be__, __only__the__power__of__the__mirror__of__Alnottis__keeps__the__world__on__edge__. __The__Twin__of__Atlantis__must__be__found__and__lost__, __setting__forward__the__Fall__." _Dana seemed quite stern as she spoke the words that thrummed with power. Dana seemed quite stern as she spoke the words that thrummed with power.

"I would have suggested trying to use the gate that Døråbning can supposedly open to the Helheim, but I think that I'm being targeted by some of the Norse gods." Some of the hints that Hel had been cruelly suggesting to him pointed to not only Odin and Loki, but perhaps other servators of Hel herself. Even his own birth had been hinted at as a pawn being moved into place on the bloody battlefield of the Aesir.

"So we're going to pick an entrance to the Underworld that shouldn't _immediately_ get people to attack us just because of who we are. Pretty sure that the three of us are rocking the Greek boat a bit. And Susano-o has some serous enemies among the Amatsukami," Janeka noted. "And that pathway between the world is being guarded already."

"I still say we should have just fought our way to the gateway to Atlantis," Dolph said. "That would have been a good challenge."

"Time is of the essence," Dana said as she checked her full body armor as she readied her mask. "I actually asked the fates of prophecy if that was a wise course and got a definite 'no'."

"So we are looking to use the Pesedjet pathway and then randomly find the way to the Atlantean Prison?" Sheila asked in confusion.

"We might have to bribe a guide down there. Don't sell your soul, but I brought a lot of gold and silver, just to be safe." The dark daughter of Ares looked very serious. In fact, she took a moment to make sure everyone had at least ten gold and ten silver coins.

* * *

><p>"I need to figure out a way to summon the Deathmobile," the big Aesire complained as he drove a rental landrover down the dusty roads of Egypt, heading to the Valley of the Kings. The really old vehicle rattled as it croaked along, almost seeming to wheeze as it drove on the sandy trail.<p>

"Yes, you do. I paid way too much to buy this piece of shit," Janeka complained as she held on in the passenger side. Janeka was a city girl, through and through. And would much rather have her office or workshop.

"Dolph, turn off here and take the left passage," the daughter of Artemis called out.

"What left passage? That's a solid cliff face!" he complained.

Janeka grabbed and spun the wheel abruptly as the driver stared fearlessly at the oncoming rock. He was not worried about bouncing off of it, though he wondered about how everyone else would deal with a crash.

"Whoa, wicked," Tsukyo said as they sailed though an ancient illusion and into the steep, slotted canyon.

The canyon opened up a bit, allowing them to see a huge and ancient temple built into the wall of the end of the canyon ahead. The Egyptian pillars held up a carving of Ra driving his chariot across the sky. A waterfall in one of the cliff faces cascaded across the sand and then into the huge, fifty foot wide entryway.

"The stone looks like it is scorched here. And that water... is black," Dolph noted, somehow feeling at ease with the concept of entering the afterlife... the Underworld. The land rover rattled as it hit a bump on the rough path, now travelling parallel to the flat black water.

The entrance swallowed the sun behind them, instantly shifting everything to a tunnel with a river at the center. The rover's head lights seemed barely travel ten feet in the darkness, though Dolph seemed unworried.

Dana seemed to be quite happy, looking around.

"Can you actually see anything out there?" Sheila asked Tsukyo in a low tone.

"Just a bit. But we don't seem to be going anywhere." He closed his eyes. "Hey guys, we _aren__'__t_ going anywhere. We're stuck."

"That's because we aren't traveling by river. I think we should pull over... there," Dana said, pointing into the darkness to a spot along the river.

"Huh. You are right," Dolph said cryptically.

"I hate when I can't see something. What is it?" Janeka grumbled.

"It's a dock," Dana explained.

The land rover sputtered a bit as Dolph skidded to a halt, then turned off the ignition. Janeka and Sheila both had a light, but there were the only ones that _seemed_ to need the light.

The little wooden dock was sticking out into the water, quite incongruous. The water did not lap and looked unpleasant, though it carried no odor.

"Something is coming," Sheila said.

"I hear it too. Someone rowing a boat here with one oar," the daughter of Ares confirmed.

Dana cursed softly. "I hope it isn't him."

'Him' became apparent soon enough, as a twenty foot boat with a hooded and cloaked figure pulled up to the dock.

"Shit. Charon the Ferryman of the Dead?" Dolph muttered darkly. "Let me do the talking, okay?"

Dana nodded very quickly, followed cautiously by Sheila and Janeka.

Charon held out his skeletal hands, expecting his payment.

"You will take us to the Underworld of Atlantis?" Dolph asked as his appearance slipped into his horrifying manner; pasty-white skin and straw-like hair. His eyes made him look slightly unhinged.

The boatman stood slightly taller, studying the Son of Hel. He chuckled softly. "An Aesir seeking Atlantis? Such a thing does not exist... officially."

"I've already been there once... I wish you to take us there again. I have ten silver for your fee," the near-giant stated.

"And who seeks passage?"

Dana spoke at this point. "No one can... officially. After all, we are going no where."

Charon's laugh sounded like a rattle, horrible and low. "Pay your fee, Aesir and no ones."

They all piled into the boat and Charon was quickly rowing them through the pitch black stillness on rippling, Stygian darkness. The slosh of the oar was almost hypnotic over the next two hours.

"I am totally lost. I can follow a trail anywhere and see in the darkest nights..." Dana said in frustration suddenly. The daughter of Artemis prided herself on her keen senses.

"We're almost there," Dolph said as he looked ahead. "I think I even see the path that he took."

Charon seemed to make a rattling noise angrily as the ferry skidded into the blistering cold sand of the beach. That caused Janeka and Sheila to jump slightly, though they were glad they could see something again.

"Jeez, gals. I thought you were braver than that, being the daughters of Ares and Athena," Tsukyo spouted out incautiously.

The hiss from Charon was explosive. "Ares and Athena? And a girl that can follow any trail? Children of three of the gods that bound me?" Blazing pits of light errupted under Charon's hood. "Dodekatheon! Betrayers! Enslavers!" His chains that held him to his ferry rattled as his form started to grow with sickening pops and cracks. He was now over ten feet tall as his started to bend and twist, extending a muzzle full of teetch.

"Um... oops?" the son of Susano-O said.

"Tsukyo! There was a reason we let Dolph do most of the talking," Sheila snapped even as she leaped to the shore.

"Ha. I'm not worried," Dolph exclaimed with the fervor of battle. His blood sang, bidding him to show his worth against such a powerful foe. He slammed down his spear, only to blink in awe as it _bounced_ off the form in front of him.

"DOLPH! He's too powerful! He's only slightly bound and used to be a god! It took Ares, Athena, Artemis and Apollo to defeat him!" Sheila was shouting out now. She had instantly sized the demon-godling up, realizing he was still on the cusp of divinity compared to her and her friends that had barely transitioned into demigods.

It was too late, as Charon's hideous claws reached out, opening him from hip to shoulder in one supernally sharp gash.

"Shit!" the Aesir gasped as he was suddenly whisked away on a wind even as Janeka and Dana started attacking Charon with pistol and sickle.

"His armor took it, but don't get into melee with him. His claws can shred a ghost eternally and shatter stone," Sheila shouted at Tsukyo who was about to charge in to punch him.

"Whoa!" The demigod of the Amatsukami was suddenly backing up, letting his gauntlets block Charon's fatal claws.

"Pull back from the water. He's chained to his ferry and can't leave it," Janeka called out authoritatively. Her pistol was firing, causing serious wounds.

Charon roared, a sound of despair and death as he grabbed his chains and started to pull his ferry behind him across the bank of the River Styx. "I will devour your souls!" The holes in his cloak healed up as the river behind him was suddenly frothing and bubbling.

"I think we should run. He's healing faster than we can hurt him," Dana noted a little worriedly.

Dolph had his spear out still, snarling at the demon as huge batwings unfurled. "I hate that."

He gasped in pain as Sheila picked him up over her shoulder and took off. Janeka, Dana and Tsukyo were only a moment behind her.

* * *

><p>"That's the best I could do. Charon's claws seems to actually wound your soul and my healing is only able to stitch up base flesh," Sheila said an hour later.<p>

"And Charon has finally given up. It looked like it was hurting himself to drag the ferry so far from the Styx. I had no idea he could even do that," Dana admitted.

"Well, now we know. And knowing is half the battle. You going to be okay, Dolph?" Janeka asked worriedly

"Yeah. I'm tougher than that. I can heal the wounds myself, but it's taking time." The big Aesir was now stitched back up, even as he forced his ichor to try to force his wound more closed. He had over a hundred stitches up his chest.

"Dana, can you try to spot us a feature in this frozen land? We need to get to the gateway," the youngest scion noted as she put away her medical kit.

"Oh, it's about fifty miles that way," Tsukyo said as he pointed off into the distance. "I can lead us to it easily."

"I guess you have a bit of traveller in you," Sheila thought aloud.

"Yup!"

They started to push through the gritty, black snow that melted in black streaks upon them, only to refreeze when the icy wind howled down upon them. Up ahead, they saw hills with broken spires and shattered towers.

"This must be lost Atlantis. Or parts of it," Janeka said as she scanned around.

They had to fight off several spectres, but here in the Underworld all of the demigods could actually affect them and the ancient ghosts were poor warriors. Tsukyo kept them moving to the main spire. Like Dolph, he seemed immune to fatigue. Janeka and Sheila were both starting to flag though.

"Hold up a second, guys. I know you three are like the energizer bunnies of demigods, but some of us are not quite as sturdy," the daughter of Ares called out.

Dana was feeling quite antsy. She pulled out a cup and rolled some bones. "Resting will be disastrous. Calamity will befall us and the world."

The youngest scion was feeling the burn of walking for hours. "There is a solution. Combat stimulants like pilots sometimes use. I'm glad I got you to get me a full combat medical kit." She pulled out the pack and started to unroll it. "Come here, Janeka." She started to carefully fill a syringe from three small bottles, using a slightly heavier needle than you would see in most hospitals.

The black woman was grumbling at that, but had to admit it was a good solution. Her fatigue and pain seemed to drop away rapidly. "Whoo. I could see why that's regulated. I'd kill for a six shot super-mocha."

Sheila finished administering her own dosage, frowning as she had to use a heavier needle. She would have to remember that she was actually a little more sturdy than Janeka.

"I found an entrance. The stench down there is bad, guys. I'm going to try and cloak us in shadows, but you still need to do your best to sneak," the daughter of Artemis said in a soft tone. "I saw a patrol of Atans earlier."

They all nodded and followed her down into the base of the central spire of Atlantis. Deeper and deeper they went, as Tsukyo and Dana guided them through the warrens. It was an hour later that they finally found the massive, underground cavern.

It was Sheila that heard the tinkling above them. What she saw caused her throat to clench. A goddess, fifty feet tall, was bound in iron chains engraved in runes and hanging from the very center and top of the cavern. Hanging from her feet was a mirror, round and perfect. It was imbued with a soft, red radiance.

The ground of the cavern was filled with the armies of Atlantis. Atans, demons and conscripted soldiers that milled around the portals as more of their servants

And she heard it breaking!

"Guys! Above us!" she shouted as the winds gathered her up and she shot into the air at near super-sonic speeds. Perhaps she could heal it! Or relieve the stress upon it with her strength.

"Whoa!" Tsukyo called out.

"Tsukyo, the rest of us can't fly!" Janeka shouted even as the armies below awoke to the danger.

The Amatsukami nodded even as he grabbed Dolph and Janeka. Dana jumped onto his back and then he shot into the air.

Sheila was holding the edges of the red mirror even as it started to develop fractures across its surface. "Come on. Its getting worse-"

"Dolph, think we can jury-rig-" Janeka was asking the larger demigod as the mirror failed.

The glass was fracturing like someone was tapping around the frame in a spiral from the outer edge to the center, suddenly and fast. It exploded inward, into an impossible space of every color imaginable. The five demigods were suddenly inside the space, looking into a hole that showed the underworld as the mirror exploded now outwards. Sheila took an immense number of shards, while each of the others in her band were hit by at least two.

With a roar like the end of the world, they were shot through time and space. The explosion traveled back through the rift, shattering the chain that it had hung onto and then exploding up to the chains that held the Titan Avatar of Darkness and Magic that burst like leaves in the wind. Demosia, Goddess of Mystery and Darkness floated down to the ground in the middle of the shattered armies of Atlantis, weeping for the loss of her nation and their worlds. Words of magic fell off her lips as she tried to summon her mother and father, brother and sisters to battle... to war!

And twisted reflections of the Gods of Atlantis answered, stepping through shattered and collapsing portals, holding them open with pure force of will and malice of spirit.

Behind each portal, apocalyptic visions of worlds ending could be seen. Planets colliding in the sky, rivers running red with blood and the oceans boiling as fire scorched everything.

"Revenge!" Badarus, Atlantean god of the Seas, demanded. "Rise! And let the shattered Island of Atlanis arise! Into the Overworld! Let us throw down all the gods... the betrayers!"

"REVENGE!" the Atlantean gods shouted out.

Green lightning struck from the black sky as the city of Atlantis started to break from its shackles in the Underworld.

* * *

><p>"Ouch. That stung," Dolph complained as he stood up. He squinted up at the pale sun as he looked around at the field of winter grass, grown tall and shaggy. It looked like a bomb had gone off about thirty feet away from him, where a blonde-haired girl was laying at the center. "Everyone okay?"<p>

"I'm fine," Tsukyo said woozily as he sat up. "Whooiee! That was fun."

"Ouch-ouch-ouch. Damn it, that bitching hurts," the daughter of Ares complained as she sat up. "Why do you guys have weird glowing lines on you?"

"Dolph's got two, so does Tsukyo. You have one and I think I have one. How about you, Sheila?" Dana called out.

There was no response to that.

"Shit. She was right on top of the explosion," Janeka said as she scrambled her her feet, pulling her hands away from where a strand of grass had tried to wrap her up. She dashed over in a flicker of speed. "Oh, man. She's covered in them." She put her hand on the owl necklace on Sheila's neck while studying her, forcing it to allow her to see the young girl's wounds. "Her... life force is weakening?" A red line flickered and faded.

Dana was frowning as she had done the same trick with the little statue of a woman on a wave of water. "I'm going to heal her before she fades away." She grimaced as she bent her legend to the task, sending a wave of life into the girl.

"Come on, girlie. Wake up," Tsukyo urged as he shook her shoulder as Dolph caught up as the slowest of the group. "Whoa, that was a weird feelings. You know how I can tell where I am? When I put my hand on her... I feel her in too many places... too many times. That's freaky, man!"

"Touch the line on your arm, Tsukyo. Tell me what you feel," the daughter of Artemis urged. As the mystic of the group, she was starting to get an idea.

"Right!" the son of Susano-o said as he touched, trying to get a feeling. "Huh. I get the feeling I'm someplace else, far away. Well, a me that is just... I don't know. Not exactly me, but still myself."

"Could it be like how gods of travellers could be in multiple places at times? Co-location. But why is she out?" Dana asked as she bent her mind to the task.

"Because she's in way too many places I bet. Each time a line fades, she gets weaker. We'll need to heal her up. Maybe even bolster her life force." Janeka put her words to action, touching the daughter of Athena's amulet again.

Sheila started breathing slightly easier.

"Ooh! My turn," Tsukyo said, duplicating her action.

"Don't die on us, brat," Dolph grumbled as he played with the Chinese healing sigil that he had stolen from a museum. His innate health magnified the power, healing twice as well as any of the other scions. With a small frown, he then bolstered Sheila's life force.

With a groan, Sheila opened her eyes. "What happened?" Flickers of dreams and images danced through her vision, confusing her.

"You went and did something heroic and nearly got yourself killed," the black Scion of Ares grumbled. "Quit that. You're too useful to have around."

The daughter of Athena winced as another line flickered out of existence. She instinctively healed herself, trying to mend her battered existence.

"Huh, the lines are fading a bit. I wonder," Tsukyo noted aloud, then blinked his eyes as he shape-shifted his form to change his hairstyle slightly and lighten his skin a bare amount. "Ha! You can cover them up."

Sheila got to her feet. "Where is the mirror?"

"Exploded. No fragments here except in us, I guess," Janeka said as she dragged Sheila to her feet. They all looked around.

"This land feels odd. Evil almost," Dana said as she bent her mystical awareness to scan the area.

"That's odd. We're in western New York state," Tsukyo noted. "It's sooo cool to be able to just know where you are."

Janeka glanced at her watch. "Except our time is off. And last I heard, New York State wasn't evil itself. Let's try to be inconspicuous, people. So try to cover up those red lines as best as possible.

* * *

><p>"I don't think we are in Kansas any more, Toto," Janeka said about twenty minutes later as the group rounded the corner on the road to see a small village that had a Mad-Max style set of walls made of junk and cars surrounding it<p>

"There are people with rifles manning the defense," Dana said, her keen eyes spotting the rough and tumble looking men and womn walking behind the wall. Only their upper bodies were visible.

Janeka had her computer up, frowning as she tried to connect to any networks. "No cell phone towers."

"That just means we need to actually talk to some people to find out what is going on," Tsukyo said with a grin.

"So let's casually walk up the road with out any visible weapons and see what our 'neighbors' here can tell us about why things don't look normal," Sheila said. She looked at them all and juggled things in her head. "I guess I'm the least threatening to them, so I'll try and talk to them."

"I do not look threatening," Janeka complained.

Dana did not look thrilled with the idea herself. "Kids are non-threatening by default. Let's just get moving. I want to get home or call Samantha."

The band of demigods walked up the cracked road under the keen gaze of suddenly worried defenders of the wall.

"That's far enough. What do you want?" called out a rough man of about fifty years old. He had a hunting rifle in his hand and looked like he knew how to use it.

"We're just a bit lost. What's with the wall?" Sheila asked casually. It looked like the wall had been there a few years.

"Only way to keep out some of the monsters. Has been like that since Hell Day. Where are you from from? You must be from out of the Blight," the old man called out.

"I think we might be from further than you think. Hell Day? Blight? I don't think we've ever heard of that before," she said carefully.

The old man (and his posse) were all looking at them carefully. "Well, it's daytime, so you sure aren't some new horror. How the hell did you miss the world nearly ending in 2007?"

"That's because our world didn't nearly end in that year. How the hell did we end up in an alternate reality?" Janeka complained.

"So you aren't monsters? Rosie, what do your crystals say?" the old man called out.

A plain young woman, with a serious expression was holding some crystals while concentrating on them. "I get a good feeling. Best I've had all month. You remember I've been warning you about that attack coming up that was going to destroy Clairmont? These people can help with it. I can feel it."

"Well, I guess that settles that. Let's get the gate open," the old man called out.

The gate was actually a school bus that had been armored along one side that they pulled forward and then parked backwards to block the way. Inside the town was the air of guarded hope and despair.

Dana looked around. "Sounds like things have been bad. Monsters? End of the world?"

"There is a hole in the center of the United States the seems to be breaking reality. Millions have died, or worse, as mythical monsters seem to be coming back. Vampires, werewolves, zombies are just the tip of the iceberg. All the little weird superstitions are real now. If you hear your name in the creak of the gate of a graveyard, your gonna die. You don't let strangers in after sunset. And the full moon let's you know when to start watching people for signs of the wolf." The old man seemed a bit frantic.

"Well, shit. That's pretty damn strange," the son of Susano-o said with his eyes wide in shock.

"Sometimes the monsters help. You aren't weird and supernatural, are you?" he demanded.

Sheila's eyes flicked over to Rosie. "Yes, actually. But we're generally the good sort. We fight monsters. It's a demigoddess's job, after all. All part of being a hero or heroine."

Dolph shrugged. "Yup."

"You got some proof of that?" the leader asked.

"Sure." Dolph then walked over to the bus and then lifted it up with some effort. "Man, that armor makes this a little heavy." He then set it back down carefully and then patted it.

"Those guns might annoy Dolph," Janeka said casually as they pointed their rifles at him. "And you don't want to annoy the son of Hel."

"Hell?" Rosie asked worriedly, as her sixth-sense was not being happy with the too-beautiful Aesir.

"Daughter of Loki? Goddess of the Dead of the Aesir," Janeka said smoothly. "Now the three of us ladies here are classic Greeks. I'm the daughter of Ares, Dana is the daughter of Artemis and Sheila is the daughter of Athena. They're adopted, I take it. And Tsukyo is out token Asian, being the son of Susano-o."

"Demigods," Rosie said in near breathless ecstasy. "Now their auras make perfect sense. More than human and so very bright and golden."

"And very lost. We fell down a rabbit hole somewhere. And we need to figure out a way back," the daughter of Ares explained. "You mind if we learn what we can?"

* * *

><p>What they learned that evening was that the world seemed to be still in the process of ending. Vampires would try to sneak in under the cover of night, werewolves would lose control under the full moon and more. But sometimes the monster seemed to not act like a monster, but more like a person. After a simple stew and learning of horrors deeper into the Blight, they decided to help out.<p>

Towns like Clairmont which were on the edge of the Blight could survive, though most people had moved out. It was a struggle as the heartland of the USA had been hard hit. A lot of farms and factories were in the midwest had almost been swallowed by the Blight, a perfectly circular area around the event. Day to day life was hard and they needed every edge they could get.

Dolph and Janeka both headed over to the town's generators. Parts for it just were not available, so they jury-rigged some tools and then built the replacements themselves. For the first time in months, powerful lights could be activated to scare away the nights predators. Tsukyo ended up doing some basic help with their water supply, tracing where an infection was. He actually ended up killing some sort of scaly predator that was hiding in one of the water tanks. Dana had ended up talking shop and helping Rosie with some of the 'wards' that the mage was able to put up on the walls.

Sheila found herself in the town's little hospital assisting with some of the more serious cases. The trio of doctors were overworked and almost lived there, helping the twenty or so very sick patients.

"Mark here got sliced up on his farm outside of town. His wife brought him in, but she had to go back out to try and save their harvest," Dr. Jamison said as he brought her to the next room with a bandaged up figure.

"Did they say what sort of animal attacked them?" Sheila asked as she looked over at him.

"No, and he's picked up a bad infection." The graying doctor looked very tired suddenly.

"Well, let's take care of the infection and then the lacerations. I can at least reduce them bruises. That will allow him to get back on his feet in the next few days," she said as she channeled her power through her relic, the Wisdom of Athena, which she held up. "He's the most seriously wounded."

One of the nurses who really looked like he needed a shave, came in. "How's old Mark?" he asked.

"Well, let's see." Jamison started to unwrap the injured man's arm, blinking in surprise as he realized that she really had just done what she had said she had. "Well, that's pretty amazing. How are you feeling, Mark?"

"Just a bit battered, but I would really love to get back to my family," the farmer said.

"Let's get you checked out then."

Sheila watched as the doctor went through the process to get Mark out. "So, how is being dead working out for you, Jeremy?" she asked casually.

The nurse's head snapped out. "Badly. How could you tell?"

The young demigoddess tapped the side of her forehead next to her eyes. "I can just see anyone's illnesses and ailments. Which you have none. And you don't smell like a human any more."

"You aren't attacking," the undead said in surprise. "I'm not here, doing any harm. I get flashes of my old life. And I hate it. I'm a person, not a monster."

"Does anyone suspect?"

"Dr. Jamison and Dr. Harris know. They let the sheriff know too. Anyone comes up missing, I'm the first suspect. But I caught two werewolves trying to sneak in. Are you... are you really a demigoddess?" Jeremy asked with a nervous gulp.

The eleven year old nodded. "I thought he was being cautious around you. Well, I guess we'll keep an eye on you, too."

* * *

><p>The next morning dawned gray and dim, like the sun did not want to cut through the leafless forest and late fall sky. Their first indication that there was a problem was the sound of gunfire and a strange roar. Dolph staggered out of a house near the gate to the town, only to blink in surprise as the armored bus knocked out of the way by a ten thousand pound hog, eyes alight in anger.<p>

"They sure grow them big up here in New York. I thought that was a saying more appropriate to Texas?" he asked as he rubbed his eyes carefully. Nope, still one huge, angry pig.

With a squeal of pure murderous madness, the huge sow charged at the befuddles Aesir as several of the militia fired their rifles at the monster from the wall. Despite being a sow, the pig was armed with four huge tusks, which it used to try and rip Dolph's stomach open and launched him over the local grocery store. "Whoa!"

Tsukyo thundered a punch to its snout with the power of the storm, actually causing the hog to take a step backwards. "What is it?"

"Nemean hog?" Sheila suggested as she dashed over from the hospital clinic a quarter mile down the road.

"Well, our Hercules just got launched," Janeka noted as she brandished her gun. "So I guess we have to hope that an ancient monster like this can be dealt with by more modern means."

"Give me a second," Dana called out as she zipped across the packed dirt near the town's entrance. Her silvery sickle wrapped around the Nemean hog's front hooves and she gave a great yank, knocking it onto its side. The ground shook under tons of pig as it kicked up a cloud of dust. "Now!"

The two demigoddesses of war thundered their pistols, actually causing small wounds. With a squeal of outrage, the hog stood back up and then healed the little pinpricks wounds. Dana actually got dragged towards it as she started to unwind her chained sickle.

"That is one seriously angry pig. Only thing that would make it perfect would be if he was white and black-! Welcome back, Dolph," Janeka called out in a ribald tone of humor as she continued to squeeze shots off with her hand-cannon.

"Pick on someone your own size!" he shouted as he used his mass, speed and momentum to cut a large gash in the legendary pig's shoulder from a three hundred foot jump. The earth shook as Dolph, quite a bit larger and heavier than when he left, landed next to the hog.

Sheila flickered over to in front of the pig and with careful timing, shot up its nose with a bullet imbued with the terror of war. "I guess even it's nose is armored."

The Nemean Hog charged at her, only to see her keep just ahead of it as she danced back faster than it could run. Bullets, a spear, a sickle and fists just bounced off the superbly tough creature as the youngest demigoddess maneuvered it back outside the town of Clairmont.

"Okay, this is getting ridiculous, guys!" Sheila called out.

"I'm going to sway it with the tides of the moon!" the daughter of the moon goddess Artemis called out as she dashed up to get into melee with the monster.

Tsukyo and Dolph both hit the hog in its massive flank at the same moment, actually knocking it sideways for two heavy footsteps on its cloven hooves. Janeka tried to get past its super-tough hide with a shot she imbued with the power of war.

Five minutes later, an eternity in this sort of fight, the young band of demigods had finished off the horror. The Nemean Hog was a ruin of stripped off flesh and shattered bones.

"Shooee. I think I'm going to barbecue that thing in recognition of how damn tough it was. Probably take most of the day," Janeka said finally.

"Sounds fun. Can I help?" Tsukyo asked eagerly.

Everyone was covered in scrapes, mostly from avoiding the titan spawn. Most of the people of town showed up as the mood turned festive. Pictures were taken and sent in. Dolph took massive strips of leather, cut by its broken off tusks to turn into a powerful armor. His hit from Charon had weighed on him and he had decided to take some proactive action.

* * *

><p>The DC-10 rumbled through the air at low altitude. Dolph was sitting in the pilot's seat, flying with a casual skill born of a bit of super-human dexterity, reading text-books and an almost uncanny sense of piloting. Dana was sitting in the co-pilot's seat, picking up the basics of how-to while they travelled while Janeka was in the 'flight engineer's' seat.<p>

The rest of the plane was basically empty. This was actually the third vehicle they had switched to in the last few days. The Astrovan had a serious case of 'crushed-itis' from an elemental hill, while everyone had agreed that driving in a truck had just not worked.

They were _all_ quite sick and tired of creepy things. Choking vines from rose bushes, statues that animated as demonic angels, a small pond that had lured Dolph and Tsukyo in with a Siren's song and tried to drown them and finally a group of vampires that attacked them looking for some mythological 'true human' that was keeping the apocalypse away.

Lake Michigan was behind and under them them while Chicago was to the south; a set of dark spires in the night only lit by occasional lights and candles.

"DOLPH!" Janeka shouted out. "I think we might have a problem."

"What's going on?" he yelled back. His and Dana's eyes were scanning the area around, expecting to see fighter jets or missiles winging their way towards them.

"Something creepy. The walls are turning into flesh," the dark-skinned daughter of Ares called forward.

"Up here too," Dana noted. "I thought I was just getting more comfortable in the seat."

"I think we better bail," Tsukyo called out as he went to the door and started to force it open.

Sheila was at his side, pushing mightily. Dana and Tsukyo were actually just a bit stronger, but with all three of them, the door ripped open like a scabbed wound. With a woosh of air, Tsukyo and Dana were dragged out and almost hit the horizontal tail.

"Come on, Janeka!" the young blonde daughter of Athena called out.

"But what about Dolph?" Janeka shouted out as she started to move toward the front.

"Get out of here! I'm about to bust out through the emergency door in the nose," the huge Aesir called back.

The inside was rapidly filling up with growing and expanding organs as the DC-10 became more and animal-like by the moment. Sheila had her back to the flap, keeping it from growing back. Bile covered hands snatched out, cousin to cousin and then Sheila put her whole back into. They explodes into the air as the plane started to flap its massive, feathered wings.

"Shit, it turned into a Roc!" the daughter of Ares noted as the massive bird started to try and bite down on something in its mouth.

Two mighty hands had opened its mouth as Dolph countered it with pure power and muscle. Muscles and sinews creaked under the pressure as the edges of the razor sharp beak cut into his hands. He grew larger even as the Roc grew to match his increase. Black, feathered wings beat with the force of a small hurricane. "Come on! Let me go!" the straw-blond Aesir shouted even as he continued his escape by directly fighting the monster.

A petite shoulder slammed into his back, body-checking him into the air. The Roc snapped at Sheila and Janeka as they tumbled through the air.

"Ow." Sheila's shoulder throbbed from the high speed impact.

"Got you!" Janeka called out as she used her own inhuman dexterity to hold onto Sheila's hand and grasped Dolph with her feet. "Let's get out of here!"

Sheila took a moment to grab Dolph more securely then zoomed off in a jet stream and almost succeeded in breaking the sound barrier.

The massive Roc cawed loudly, but was far too slow to keep up with Sheila and Tsukyo as they flew under the power of an on-rushing storm into the night.

"Let's just keep going," Dana called out. "We're only about a hundred miles away from the impact point."

* * *

><p>It looked like a storm of light that swirled around a five hundred foot wide hole in reality. Black-light, purples and other, more exotice colors heralded the the location with a pillar of light that rose miles into the sky. Too look upon the sight directly would have driven a normal person insane.<p>

"What is that?" Tsukyo asked while holding Dana under one arm. "It's really messing up my sense of location. It's like nowhere and everywhere but not... I can't describe it right."

"What do you think, Sheila? Some sort of magical wormhole between dimensions?" the almost pitch-black daughter of Ares asked. She was being held on one side of Sheila, Dolph was on the other.

"One that goes into some sort of Titan Realm? Is this what our world can look forward to?" Dolph asked from their tall vantage point in the air.

"Military is on the radio, wondering what da hell we are. Let me..." Janeka called out, getting line of sight on a USAF plane that was circling high in the sky far behind them. "Got it. Sending their computers a message that we aren't a threat."

The youngest demigoddess was intently focused on piercing the veils between their space and the other side. "I think I see a focal point. A museum of some sort. I think we can get to it." Otherworldly energy from the shattered mirror hummed in her body as the lines lit up slightly.

"Let's do it," Dana said. "Most of the time if you can shatter the focus, the portal will collapse."

The two flyers charged into the vortex of magical light, fighting against strange forces as the portal tried to pull them away or fling them out of any sane existence. Winds howled, but when they came near the Daughter of Athena and Son of Susano-o, those gusts were tamed against their unreal Titanic masters.

"Throw me!" the suddenly larger Aesir shouted even as his spade-shaped spear appeared in his hand. He felt it appropriate to suddenly let his natural, horrid visage take over his form. Sheila's deceptively strong arm snapped the nearly five hundred pound semi-giant through the air.

Janeka and Sheila stared to fire their pistols that they empowered with the deadly force of War. The 1960's style museum almost exploded from the the three of them slamming their attacks home. The daughter of Artemis was only a moment behind him, dancing between the flying bricks and collapsing plaster.

A stunned demon, straight out of contemporary fiction, had only a moment to look up with his glowing red eyes before his crimson hide was cut open from hip to shoulder in a spray of fiery blood. Another two demons received the gift of two thunder empowered kicks curteousy of Tsukyo.

"Protect the Artifact! The Earth is destined to be ours! It is fated!" a green-scaled demon shouted, then grunted as copper-jacketed bullets from Janeka's gun silenced him forever.

Dana appeared from the shadows, feinting an attack that seemed to miss a twelve foot tall, six-armed snake-demoness. The silver syckle gouged out a cut right through three protective circles of magic. With words of power, she stunned a demon with bad luck; a curse of the evil eye that any warlock would have been proud to cast.

The blood-drenched golden statue of an alien angel shattered into hundreds of pieces across the rank and fetid interior of the museum as two booming gunshots rang out as one.

And then the Earth rumbled as motes of green sunlight, blue sparks and sheets of red lightning exploded. The poor building's roof would have pieces found as far away as Texas and as far north as the Artic ice sheet. But the horrendous, eye-wrenching pit into a netherworld of nightmares and madness popped like a soap bubble, leaving a stunned world behind.

Somehow those five strangers had flown in and destroyed something that had seemed unstoppable and as unfathomable as the magic realm it was created from.

The five demigods tried to stay together as the artificial space collapsed, but their strange red-marks upon their bodies pulled them apart. Each of them struggled for control of their new, sudden path.

Tsukyo would be the luckiest. With his connection to godly domains of the traveller he appeared back in upstate New Jersey. Dolph snatched out at the flickering shadows when he saw something that looked familiar, pulling himself to stop in the far northern part of Norway. Janeka and Dana both used their keen senses and superhuman agility and where able to pull themselves to two seperate areas of the Mediteranean Sea; Italy and Greece.

Sheila found herself buffeted extra hard by her innumerable extra hyper-dimensional fractures that existed within her body. With her expanded senses, she caught glimpses of herself in strange, far off lands and fantastical science and mythical realms. It almost overloaded her extraordinary senses, fully the equal (if in different breadth) of Janeka or Dana. Finally she spotted a dark realm that looked familiar.

The splash into the Stygian waters of the River Styx was heard for quite a distance.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 12: Return to the Darkness<strong>

The blonde daughter of Athena floated in stunned pain in the brackish water, pulled along by unrelenting currents. Breathing in the noxious waters set her coughing furiously and awoke her to the dangers. Even her unrelenting eyesight could not see far int he onyx gloom of the underworld. With nothing better than a hope, she set off crosswise to the current, hoping to find solid land.

Half an hour later, she pulled herself through the marshy banks, the cloying mud covering her in a truly disgusting mix of water, red clay and other things she dare not dwell on too much. "Who the heck are you?"

Hidden mostly behind a massive, weeping willow tree was a young man in a long trenchcoat. "What does it matter to you, Titan Spawn?"

"Hey!" she cried right back. "Do I really look that bad? Ick." She tried to squeegie off the worst of the muck.

"English? What they hell are you playing at... Hey, I know you. You're that kid that's part of that group of demigods from California." He stepped out, the hidden sword now visible in his hand. "Sharon, right?" With a wave, he made a clean stone path from the earth itself for her to walk on over and out of the muck. Fate bent to the moment as his Legend impressed itself upon them both.

"Sheila. Sheila Henderson. And who are you?" the very bedraggled girl asked warily even as she felt something change about him.

"Alexander Prestwick, son of Hades and Demigod of Dying," he replied, his voice not quite hiding a bitter tone at the pronouncement of his title.

The young girl pursed her lips in rapid thought, her blue-green eyes seeing things in his posture and picking up subtle emotions playing across his face. Her nearly unparalelled intellect made several quick conjectures. "Bad prophecy?"

"Quick on the uptake," Alexander replied slowly. "Yes. I have been prophesied to die at the hand of Charon the Boatman, yet I have to get past him to lend my father my sword to save his life and keep the Titans from Tartarus." He sat down on the gnarled roots of the willow tree to get out of the muck.

"You haven't been able to find a loophole?" the blonde asked as she tried to remove more of the muck from the fetid, swampy shore of the Styx.

"Not really. I think I've figured out a way to save Hades after consulting with Delphi." Alexander stood up, his black eyes shadowed under his raven shag of hair. "Marenethi at Delphi explained that it is just my sword that needs to be brought to Hades where it is required. But Charon knows that I walk these lands and hunts me. He believes that by using my blood, he can break his chains of servitude."

Sheila's keen nose noted the divine tell-tale scent of a fellow Dodekatheon; hot olive-oil and (strangely) the sound of a murmuring crowd. "You sound a bit... desperate."

Dark eyes studied her angrily. "Yes, I am. I have until tomorrow to get to my father's side to release him from a trap, else he will be slain. And with him out of the way, the island of heroes will fall sway to his conqueror." His eyes seemed to bore a hole into her soul. He suddenly pointed his sword at her, inches from her face. "So I am going to have to do something incredibly stupid for a family that mostly hates me. Sheila, daughter of Athena, will you carry my sword to my father?"

"Are you sure that is the best course?" the girl asked him carefully.

"It is the only course. I had despaired that with my death that everything would fall to ruin," he bemoaned. "If only I could make sure that you could make it there in time."

"I'm fast. Very fast, though not a patch on Uncle Hermes," she said, though silently added 'yet' to her phrase.

"Then we might have time. Take Hadecleus. It's a useful sword, though not the mightiest Relic in existence." Alexander carefully handed her his trusted sword. "It should, with a little luck, allow you to navigate the rivers. I don't suggest swimming in some of the nastier rivers. I seriously doubt that you picked up Achille's invulnerability."

"That's only one legend," she noted. Though the young demigoddess had no desire to to try and steal ambrosia or the nectar of the gods, then throw herself on a holy blaze to burn the mortality from her body. "Though maybe I should take a few vials of the water, just in case." She put her words to action, quickly using her expanding powers over the skies to craft a bottle from the mists and then filled it with the water Styx.

That caused Alexander to snicker. "So that's what young wisdom in action looks like? I guess it is a bit smart to grab something like that, just in case." He then held his own hand above the murky ground, growing another sword that looked identical to his Hadecleus. They both felt the weight of his legend bearing down upon them as they fell into a Fate-Binding. "I'll wear this openly, while you can use my swords power of invisibility to rush past Charon as I distract him."

"Why don't you use that power to hide from him?" Sheila asked carefully as she set her mind to try finding any way to save him. For some reason, she felt closer to him than she had even her cousin. The alien feelings, birthed by the Fate-Binding were hitting her weakly developed emotional maturity hard.

"Prophecy. I feel bound to it even as it weighs down upon men. And I can make my death mean something, rather than just be that fool of Hades' son.

"But perhaps both of us can defeat him. Or I can try to gather my band of heroes," she argued, knuckles tight on the sword.

"It is too late," the demigod of death and dying said. "He is nearly upon us. Hide from his sight. And prepare to run."

That was when she realized she could hear the sound of a boat upon the water. She struggled with the sword for a moment, but faded out of sight as the ferryman of the River Styx appeared in the dark of the distance. Charon's chains rattled as his skeletal arms pushed the boat towards them. The air itself seemed to gathering a heaviness of the gravity of importance.

"Alexander, Son of Hades. The ghosts of the rivers speak that your blood will free me," the raspy voice of the undead demon called out from under his hood. A snuffling noise came from under it. "The Fates told me you would no longer run. That you know this is your Doom."

"True enough, demon. But I'll spend it fighting you." The ground rumbled under the river as pillars arose within the river, tightening him to his Fate and Fate-Binding to Charon and Sheila. "The Doom of the Underworld fall to us!" He started to walk out to meet the ferry.

"Us?" Charon suddenly said, his snuffling picking up a fading scent. "Trickery! You were supposed to be alone! Lost! They promised!" Bat wings errupted from his back and his eyes took on an unholy radiance. "Die, Son of Hades so that all hope fails the Gods!"

Alexander let his new sword speak to him, sending a prayer to his young cousin. The earth formed up into a wave, only to be shattered by one wicked claw of the demon in front of him. "For Olympus! For the Gods!"

Those would be his last words. Sheila felt her heart break as Alexander Prestwick, Son of Hades, spent his life to save those that cared nothing for him. In a moment of kismet and balance, she was forced to care enough to balance the scales.

Every hero should be known and adored; even if for just one moment and one person.

* * *

><p>The black waters of the River Styx spun beneath Sheila's feet as she willed everything she could to run faster. It was the sword clinking in her hand that reminded her of another Relic. The trophy that she had taken from her other murderous cousin. The Ring of Fleeting Health struggled against her wishes once, twice but the third time really was the charm.<p>

Her feet suddenly sped up an amazing amount. If she had a mind, she would have been amazed at the plume of water being shot into the air behind her. Her keen, supernatural senses stretched out while holding the Hadecleus. She could feel what seemed to be a cold pit open in her stomach, calling her with an uncaring demand for all those things that were life.

In a very short time, she saw the banks of the river, teaming with what appeared to be warring armies. Hades' army of the dead, led by ancient heroes, battled against giants, Nemean monsters and the earth itself. Sheila gulped as she saw a huge figure on the banks, overlooking the battle.

On the far side, she saw a mass of limbs attacking as if an army itself, easily dispatching its foes. A Hekatonkheire? Free and fighting at the behest of the Titans?

She kept her distance from the mighty Titan, a monstrous mother that was birthing more monsters to fight in the battle. She stopped stock-still as several of the giants looked in her invisible direction.

"Did you feel the earth move there?" the Oni asked his compatriot in ancient Japanese.

"Yeah, but it stopped. Hades' probably sent another spy. That's why we're here, duh. None of his servants can fly here thanks to the mystic wards," his fellow Japanese demon noted.

So you can not fly and can not walk on the ground. That seemed a rather ingenious method to stop spies. But she was not here to spy, but to get past them and to the gates of the Acropolis. She suddenly grinned.

The young, invisble demigoddess suddenly dashed forward and then leaped to land as lightly as a spider on the first guards head. Her next leap took her over a hundred and sixty feet to land lightly on a twelve foot tall Cyclops that was roaring a challenge at the Greek heroes ahead of him.

In just two minutes, she was now dashing across the tassles of the helms of heroes to appear next to a grand figure wearing black-steel armor. "Lord Hades, King of the Underworld, I come bearing a sword in the name of Alexander," she called out as she appeared in front of him kneeling, the sword held out horizontally in her hands.

"So my foolish son failed? I knew he was weak," the forbidding God of Death said with a sneer. "That is my sword, fashioned from my own ichor and the darkest, hardest steels of my realms. But it can not break this barrier that traps me here and Coatlique's army over-matches my own. Especially with the One-Hundred-Handed." Black eyes glared at the amorpheus form that had helped overthrow the titans in the last war. Damn them for escaping Tartarus!

"Yet prophecy states that his sword would save your life, Dread Hades," she countered.

"Lord Hades, she speaks the truth as she knows it. You were the one that bargained with luminous Apollo for your son's gift of prophecy. The fact that it foretold his death only shows that it was a strong power," the vibrant, pretty goddess at his side noted. "Who are you, child, that comes bearing Alexander's sword?"

"I am Sheila, daughter of Athena. He begged that I bring the sword," she explained while she clamped down hard upon her anger at the way Alexander was being dismissed. "I had washed ashore of the Styx while trying to get back to my own world."

Persephone nodded. "Then perhaps you are the one that will wield the sword to garner our release?"

"Pah, she is barely a demigoddess. Even weaker than Alexander was. What made that maudlin women think to name him after that ancient hero is anyone's guess."

Sheila was really fighting to keep her instinctive dislike for this arrogant god from showing on her face. Like many Greek gods, what he wanted he took or stole with little regard. With a chill, she remembered that Hades would have let the world languish in perpetual winter to have just one goddess. "Perhaps it was Fate making sure that I was here to be of use, Lord Hades?"

The god grumbled, but nodded in agreement. He stepped into the gates as heroes and myrmidons retreated behind the white walls of his Acropolis. "I had not expected such an attack. And my skills are not directly pertaining to war, unlike Ares and Athena. And I do not have my brother's lightning bolts to lay low my foes." His voice barely bothered to try to hide his avarice for the powerful weapons.

The gates had barely slammed closed behind them when the giants started to pound on it. Heroes dropped massive reinforcing beams up against the back, but it was a futile effort.

"So there is a magical barrier around the Acropolis?" Sheila asked. "I assume you had a route to escape to some redoubt?"

Hades nodded. "Yes, but it through the heavy earth and it is warded by two Titans working in concert. If I only had time, I might be able to sneak out."

"And leave me to my death, husband?" Persephone asked candidly, one dark eyebrow raised in curiosity.

"Bah, you know they will try to capture you. Then I can do what I did best until Hermes was born and steal you away again," the God of Death said dismissively.

"I'd rather not visit Tartarus as a prisoner, _husband_." Persephone did not look pleased at all. "Besides, you have still failed to steal my heart as you promised."

That got her a dark glare from the Death God.

They passed through an ancient, massive Parthenon-like temple. Hades ignored the massive wealth of gilded statues, gem encrusted treasures and offerings that sat upon pillars in alcoves. His private quarters were opulant, decadent and almost wholly soulless. Past his bed chambers (and the huge round bed) he took them down a secret entrance in the wall.

Cobwebs nearly filled the steps that led down to a narrow passage that winded its way through the stone under the gaze of skulls imbedded in the wall. The passage widened and in front of them was another, open cavern. Around the entrance were glowing crystals that gleamed with an intelligence and malevolence that matched any evil Sheila had met.

Hades put his hand against the barrier, causing it to flicker with purple lightning. "They were cunning in how they created this. I can break through, but it will leave me weakened and ripe for counter attack. An aspect of myself must be used, but is not enough by itself."

CLANG! went Alexander's Hadecleus as it bounced off, causing Persephone to jump slightly.

"Hmm. Not that easy. So perhaps..." Sheila closed her blue-green eye while holding the sword carefully. "Yes, that could be it. They know you hold dominion here. So the requirement for something from you is a limitation placed there. but I have other powers." Lightning crackled over the sword as she charged it with the power of the Sky as her birthright from Zeus, similar to how Tsukyo fought with his fists and feet. Wither that was from Athena's allowance of using Zeus's lightning or her own quirk from her natural father was something she was unsure of.

Then a deep, angry red glow suffused it, surprising Hades as he narrowed his black eyes. "Lightning and implacable War? I see Athena's hand within this," he muttered softly to himself.

Hadecleus swept up in a high arc and then back down as Sheila put her back and all into the attack. The ironic twist that had been cursed upon the barrier, that it must be of Hades was met, but the power of the Storm proved itself inimical to Coatlique's power over the Earth. The Titan screeched her anger as her barrier was rent in one burst of power.

Hades laughed, dark and cruel. "Oh, what a jest. To owe the daughter of Athena. Persephone, let us be off-"

Coatlique arose from the ground in front of him, over twenty feet feet tall. "You will not escape, Hades. Now that you are weakened, you are finished." Somehow she made being a pregnant woman terrifying.

"We are not weakened, foul mother of monsters," Persephone called out even as her own powers of the Earth arose within her. "Are you ready to face us both at our full power without your armies?" With a wave, a landslide of rock lashed out to batter the Mother of the Azlanti.

Hades was already drawing on the powers of Darkness within his realms, blinding the Titan with his powers. Sheila charged forward, running across the boulder-strewn cavern and smashed Hadecleus down again, lightly scratching the Titan.

"This is a battle of gods. Be away with you," the God of the Dead ordered. "Return to the mortal realm... Now! Cerebrus will let you past his gate."

She wanted to argue, but she really was a flea in scale to their power. She took off in a flash, running past giants that ran to aid Coatlique, following the touch of Death within Hadecleus. Once again she ran upon the top of the River Styx, but then kept going past it and uphill. She soon found the three-headed guard dog, standing in front of an entrance over the bodies of six giants.

Two heads snapped up, snarling and it lunged forward to the length of its chain.

"Hades said that I would pass, but I think I will do more than that." The young demigoddess held out her hand as she healed his wounds. She blinked as she realized she barely managed to heal only a third of his wounds. "There, that is the best that I can do."

Cerebrus's third head had awoken, growling at her for a moment. Then it whined like some demented, overgrown puppy. She trotted off between its legs, not having to duck in the slightest to get past the mammoth hound.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 13: The Temporal Trail<strong>

It was a week after they had all returned back to the 'mortal' realm. Sheila had been staying at Janeka's warehouse in New York for the most part. A warrant had been issued for her arrest in California thanks to Attorney General Jack Northrup.

"Are you sure she is fine?" Tsukyo asked Dana at the door to her meditation room.

The daughter of Artemis cracked open one eye. "She's just being a teenager. I guess she ended up in the Underworld and had a bad experience. It's not like its a nice place, after all. "

"I suppose. But it's just a little odd that she would be moody. I thought that was Dolph's or your thing," the half-Asian noted as he toweled off some sweat from his martial arts practice.

Sheila ignored their conversation, even if she could hear it quite easily from her lab. Strange purple and green leafed plants were her interest as she worked on one of her 'make the world a better place' projects. She was trying to make a weed that was very efficient at pulling carbon out of the air. The trick was to make it stop before it changed things too far the other way.

So she bit back a curse as the power went out. "DOUGAL!" she shouted at the dwarf. "We told you to not use the high intensity arc-welder and the electric furnace as the same time!"

"I dinna do it!" the gruff dwarf shouted back. "I was just using the forge."

"Not me," called out Dolph as he carefully put away his tools. He had been working on his Death Mobile, adding new wheels which would allow it to drive through the ground.

Janeka's office door opened. "It's more than the warehouse. All the power on our block... no as far as I can see down here in the dock is out. Let me hit the emergency services to find out what's causing this," the daughter of Ares called back. She had her notebook and powering it up. "Gotta remember to add a bigger generator."

Everyone crowded into her office except Dougal, who avoided the open sunlight through her windows. The dwarf definitely did not want to be turned to stone.

"Power's out from here to Boston," Janeka muttered as she typed. "No, MIT's Cambridge Electron Accelerator is the center. And that's too damn big of a coincidence."

"The molybdenum-uranium accelerator coils?" Sheila asked in surprise. "I thought you were having trouble figuring out who was manufacturing those for the time displacement device?"

They had been tracking the threads of science discovery that they had stumbled over at Berkeley (though the youngest Scion was starting to suspect that might have been a lead to get them onto the trail).

"FEMA and emergency response teams have traced the over-draw on the electrical grid to a lab MIT-Bates Linear Accelerator Center. Dammit, I should have spotted that name. He's a leading scientist into temporal physics. I think we need to get there as fast as possible." Janeka stood up and slipped her notebook into a carry-pack. "Gear up, folks. We're heading to just north of Boston."

"Death Mobile is ready to go," Dolph called out eagerly. "We can drive right through the earth if need."

"Traffic lights are going to be out the entire way, so unless we want to get stuck in traffic we are going to have to do that or run all the way," Dana noted aloud.

"It's about two hundred miles, so maybe we should run, fly or whatever instead of just driving?" Janeka noted.

"Not flying!" Dougal called out. "And not being carried around in a box."

Dolph did not look very happy, though Tsukyo patted him on the shoulder. "I'd rather not fly too."

The daughter of Artemis had a smirk on her lips. "Don't worry, Dolph. I don't fly either, but I'm sure we can keep up with those three."

That should have been his clue to be worried, but the big Aesir was never the most observant. The battered looking Dwarf took the time to go hide in the warehouse before someone caught him up in that madness.

* * *

><p>"I. Hate. You," he shouted in Dana's ear as her feet touched down in the center of Broadway.<p>

Dana just grinned, crouched down again and then leaped. She had recently figured out that she could now jump thousands and thousands of feet (almost four and a half miles!) but had to be slightly careful on the landing.

"He was really asking for that, wasn't he?" the young, blonde Dodekatheon asked her older cousin that she was holding under her right arm.

Janeka just had this shit-eating grin at the poor Aesir's discomfort. "I think he didn't want to be carried by you or Tsukyo. Might hurt his manliness quota or somethin'."

Tsukyo was spinning and looping in the air, keeping up with the hulk-jumping daughter of Artemis. "Weeee!"

"I thought I was the kid," Sheila grumbled. "He's five years older than me!"

"That's only sixteen, ya know," the ebony-skinned Scion noted aloud. "You're way too serious for a kid, ya know that?"

"It's a serous world," she countered as they rocketed after the daughter of the moon goddess and her captive Aesir. "You'll have to distract Dolph from his dislike of this travel."

The daughter of Ares was glad her blush could not really be see due to the color of her skin.

The next hour passed in a blur as they picked up two traffic helicopters on their way north by north-east.

"You see that?" Sheila asked Janeka as they slowed down over the lab they had been heading to. Cop cars were lined up with a good dozen police pointing guns at something.

"Yeah, another quasi-mechanical Cyclops. It just standing in front of the door to the new annex. Which means we need to get past it to get into that lab ASAP, people," the daughter of Ares replied as she zoomed her vision in to study the one-eyed giant.

Dana actually threw Dolph at the perigee of her leap even as he swelled in size. Døråbning til Grav, The Shovel, was swung with precise timing, cleaving the surprised cybernetic monster's mechanical right arm off at the shoulder. He was actually an inch taller than the giant, hitting it again with a massive horizontal sweep that knocked it back ten feet.

"BONZAI TREE!" Tsukyo shouted, landing feet first with a clap of thunder on the Cyclop's head.

The Cyclops was staggering back as it feebly tried to fend off the two male Scions as they laid into it.

Sheila floated over to the officers that had responded. "You guys all right here?" she called out carefully.

"You are those demigods from Scion Watch?" the Boston Metro Police officer asked, startled as he realized his day was actually much more bizarre than he had thought.

"Ayup. Looks like the boys have finished administrating the beat-down on our cyber-cyclops. There might be more monsters, so stay behind us," Janeka said cheerfully.

Dana landed right next to them as they entered the shattered door. "Forgot that I'd throw myself off direction tossing Dolph like that," the daughter of Artemis complained.

"Conservation of momentum is a bastard like that," Janeka noted with a smirky grin.

They followed the Cyclop's trail into the basement and into a huge, two-hundred foot wide room filled with a massive, circular ring that had lightning crackling along the edge. Parts of it glowed molten; melted and damaged.

"They got it to work. Son of a bitch, they really got the displacement to work," the daughter of Ares said, thinking very unkind things. "I'm not sure I have fully deciphered the whole equation. I think I do have the basics down." Her chocolate eyes were studying the whole affair closely.

"So they got away? Man, we came all the way from New York," Tsukyo complained loudly.

"What do you think, Janeka? Think we can repair it?" Sheila said as her own eyes were taking in the machine. Coils, capacitors, transformers had been meticulously placed.

"Godly kit-bashing? Sounds like an interesting challenge," Dolph said with a nasty grin on his face.

Janeka nodded. "You're both right, we can do this. We're not going to let a little thing like impossible physics slow us down. Here's what we need to do..." the Scion of Ares started to explain.

Dana and Tsukyo could barely follow what the three of them started to expound upon, even as they started to pull apart and then cobble together a temporary fix. Dolph's mighty fingers worked with the deft power of the Earth as he molded scalded metal back into the correct shape and affixed Nordic runes with his fingernails that extolled its original works upon it.

Janeka had moved over to the computer system and copied what should have been the _erased_ coordinates within the powerful system, the recreated the exact power and settings that had been used. The ichor within her blood sang in her mind, empowering her to bypass the inhuman security and rebuild the program they needed.

During this Sheila had been realigning coils and attaching her own Greek scribing that burned with her power as she helped Dolph rebuild the temporal accelerator.

The dark-haired daughter of Artemis had watched the trio in action for a bit, then started to assist them by directing Tsukyo and herself to lift and work within the well-oiled team. She bent her will and ichor, making them all work together in perfect harmony and drastically cutting down the time.

Fifteen minutes later, a modern and impossible miracle had been performed even as police, professors and news reporters all watched from the doorway.

"All aboard. Next stop, the Mythic Age," Janeka called out even as she moved to the little platform at the center of the ring. "Sorry for the next brown-out, but I set up a reboot sequence for all the power grids. It should only be about ten minutes."

"Chroniton particle flux is consistent," the youngest Scion called out.

"Got a vibration in the fifth junction, but it should last one full power shunt. Yo, guys at the door. You might want to back up in case this explodes," the Son of Hel shouted out over the protesting whine of the time accelerator.

"Choo choo! Time to board," Tsukyo called out excitedly.

"That was lame, Tsukyo," Dana said with a roll of her eyes.

"But you love me anyways, right?" the half-Asian asked in a faux-worried voice that got a laugh from the other four demigods.

The ring of meticulously designed temporal focusing transformers ratcheted up to full power and with a flash, the band of demigods were rocketed down a wormhole.

* * *

><p>With a flash of blue, actinic lightning, they reappeared on the edge of an ancient port town even as a storm of biblical proportion raged across the waters. Lightning struck from the Storm even as the Flood rose up from the waters to batter at a Titan of pure darkness that roared defiance against them.<p>

"Where are we?" the big Aesir asked as he looked around. The very air throbbed with power as Gods and Titans warred.

"Somewhere on the borders of Ancient Greece on the east end," Tsukyo replied helpfully. Being a Traveller was so useful at times.

"I've got the scent. Its hours old and moved off-" Dana called out, then snapped her head around to look at a shooting star that had been ejected from the storm. "Incoming!" A roaring wall of wind and water was roiling over the waters at them.

They all scattered as a hurricane had been spawned from the pure expression of the Storm and the star hit the ground with the force of a massive bomb.

The figure in pre-historic armor groaned in the two hundred foot crater he had created. In moments he was staggering to his feet.

"Father!" Janeka blurted out.

Dark-skinned Ares took note of the figure that had ducked behind boulders. "Who goes there? Speak, lest I think you are an enemy of the Gods!" He was speaking a more polished version of Ancient Greek than had ever been recorded.

"She just said you were her father, uncle," Sheila called out in Ancient Greek as she stepped out from behind the cracked boulder she had used as cover. "I am Sheila of the Dodekatheon."

"I'm Janeka. Hello father," the black demigoddess of war and artifice called out.

"Eh?" the burly warrior said as he took in the slight and short form before him.

"I am Dana, adopted daughter of Artemis, uncle," the final Greek demigoddess called out.

"Dolph of the Aesir," the biggest demigod called out.

"And I'm Tsukyo, son of Susano-o of the Amatsukami," the last scion called out.

"You are my child? How amazing. What brings you here to this battle and war?" the seven foot god of war demanded as he gripped his spear tightly. He seemed to be studying the strange, lithe figure of his daughter very intently.

"We are following someone from our lands and they passed through here. It is very important that we find them," Dana said glibly. "We do not want to be a bother, but this seems very important. We have traveled a very long time to a very far off land to find this trail."

Ares seemed unconcerned as he stretched out a bit, axe readied in his hand. "If you are foes to the Titans, then I care not. I shall have to talk to father about more of my siblings. Pfah. I can not wait until when and then and such are tamed. They should finish binding Chronus (and hence the Titan Realm of Infinity) into the deepest pits of Tartarus soon."

Sheila narrowed her eyes and then looked over at Janeka whose wide eyes were suddenly very, very hard and narrowed.

"Gotta be why. Someone knows this is the only time where a Titan that is time itself was captured," Janeka muttered.

"Mighty Ares, do we have your leave? Our trail grows cold," Sheila called out very politely, even as Janeka snorted derisively.

"I shall track you down later. I have to bring you before father," the god boomed out. "But I must be off. We must cow Nox this day." Ares took off in long, low stride.

"Let's go. The hunt is on," Dana called out coldly. Her persona as the implacable huntress was quite scary to see indeed. She had her mask that totally hid her face on and was still garbed in the black combat fatigues and boots.

They took off at a faster pace than Ares had run, only held back by Dolph's insistence to keep his boots mostly on the ground, though he did start taking huge leaps of over two hundred feet. Sheila tried to match that, but quickly found out that she could only jump to half his jump distance. It was a purely muscle-powered thing. Dana offered to teach him the trick of the much longer leaping.

Even so, they were making decent time.

* * *

><p>As night fell, they stopped at the edge of a hill. In the distance they saw an island.<p>

"If we keep going at our same speed and direction, it's headed right to that," the daughter of Artemis called out.

Janeka was studying the island with her many advanced and inhuman senses. "Place is riddled with caves. Huh. That's weird, but I see a large bronze trap-door, covered in symbols.

"On the south side of that second hill?" Sheila asked, realizing that must be what was reflecting the Sun there. She spun out her senses to view the location from above. "Looks like some entrance into the Underworld. At least according to the markings I see."

"Tartarus. Come on people, we need to catch up," Janeka called out. She stopped at the shore a moment later, looking over at the big, white-blond Aesir. "You gonna be able to handle this?"

"Yes," he said in frustration. The temperature suddenly dropped around him as he started to "skate" across the ice that formed in front of him.

Sheila, Janeka and Tsukyo ran across the water at their full speed and waited on the shore while Dana just leaped the distance.

"I'm so learning that jumping thing," Dolph muttered in complaint as he finally caught up.

They pushed through to the twenty-foot wide bronze door on top of a low part.

"This isn't just a door, but a warding that is trying to close this particular entrance," Dana realized as she read the mystical runes on it.

"That could be very useful at some point," the youngest Scion said as she quickly committed the design to memory. "But can we open it?"

"If someone just came through recently, I betcha we can. Dolph? Tsukyo? Dana? Sheila? Hell, everyone but me, basically, try to lift it at one side," Janeka called out, sounding frustrated.

"Here," Dana called out as she pointed at on edge of the circle. The trail led exactly here.

Dolph's fingers broke through the stone at the edge, even as his mighty back strained. The other three quickly jumped in and with a scream that sound like the damned in the wind, the sealed off entrance into the Underworld opened.

Dana sniffed at the ground, then almost growled in frustration. "We're falling further and further behind-"

"Damn it," Dolph interrupted. "Fine, Tsukyo, you can carry me." With a bit of concentration, Dolph was suddenly shorter than naturally possible for him.

"Don't worry, big guy, it's just for this chase," the flamboyant Son of Susano-o said. He got the big demigod on his back and then the four of them ran. Tsukyo actually lit the way with sunlight radiance, glowing eerily in the gloom as they all traveled much, much faster.

It was not long until they came to one of the myriad rivers, which they didn't even slow down in the slightest for, dashing across faster than most people could even blink. Dana's nose was flared as she tracked, a predatory gleam in her eyes.

Finally, up ahead, a massive black tower the size of a huge mesa hove out of the cloying mists of the underworld. They dashed between massive pillars that did not react to the children of their makers until they came up to a massive set of black steel doors.

"The gates of Tartarus. Somehow I doubt they will believe us that we are chasing someone from thousands of years in the future," Janeka muttered darkly.

Dana had not stopped, following the path right up the side of the massive fortress-prison of obsidian. The trail had led her to a small opening that was not visible from below at all.

"A secret passage?" More and more curious, Sheila thought to herself.

"That's... small," the part-giant Aesir said in tone that fumed with a heated annoyance.

He did eventually fit, even if he had to shrink himself to his smallest (a mere five foot ten) and let himself be dragged by his feet. His arms trailed behind him as he really hoped he did not get stuck.

Ten minutes later the demigods were creeping through the prison of the Titans and their Titanspawn. They were flickers of movement as Dana kept them following the path. Secret passages, hidden doorways and air vents that would be impassable to almost anyone else were managed without too great a fuss.

Dolph's great strength allowed for the forcing open of a stuck stone doorway, while several tricky puzzles were completed in competition between Janeka and Sheila. Dana pierced a magical puzzle with her mystical insight and Tsukyo bypassed one trap due to always knowing where he was and where he was planning to go.

The depths of Tartarus, even in this ancient and bygone day, where a dim and dark place filled with monsters. They path they followed into the cavernous pits below avoided the greater danger of the jailers; the Hekatonkheires, giants, dragons and soldiers.

"It went down into this pit just a six hours ago," Dana finally said.

"Guess there is no going back," Janeka replied with a look of frustrated concentration. Would it be Hermes or Athena, she wondered? Those were the only two possible suspect in her mind from all the clues. They all slid down the steep sides of the hole in the ground, hundreds of feet wide.

Chained to the wall and looming over them, even if he was sitting, was the battered Titan Chronus. "Have you come to taunt me for being defeated and chained, betrayer kin?" the bearded man-looking being demanded through his bruised lips. "Only because of Gaia siding with you has my ignominy come to pass... But this, too shall pass, as time is fleeting."

"No one is here?" Tsukyo asked in confusion as he looked around frantically.

Dana had walked close, under the gray eyes of the Titan. "The tail ended here, where a great magic was wrought."

"Ah, you followed my first visitor." Chronus laughed, a cruel thing that broke all things. "I do not know who they were, as they were cloaked in illusion. But they demanded of me my ichor and then finished the crafting of a short staff or a scepter. Then they used the power that all Gods feared and banned, locking it up for 'forever'. Then they disappeared through time."

"Dana, I need you to give us any clues to when they went," the daughter of Ares called asked of their most keen huntress.

The dark-haired daughter of Artemis nodded grimly even as she bent her mystical senses. Her insight into the occult, investigation and tracking bordered on the godly level. She chanted a spell, opening her Third Eye again. She desperately reached further into her ichor, latching on to a new power of the Moon that allowed her to test the distortion in time.

"Olympus, centuries from now. It's hard to understand from the time-" she started to say.

"Aye, only now are the currents of time tamed and locked off. But you are running out of that precious commodity. They are coming to finish my bindings, locking me away from any contact. Logos knows that people would covet my powers," the bound Titan said in a soft, booming voice. "Now that you've followed her trail, what will you do?"

Dolph narrowed his pale, blue eyes. "I can get us out of here. Døråbning til Grav has the power to open a gateway in and out of the Underworld." He summoned the spear from its shadow-space and gathered his might within his blood. The ground shook even as a portal appeared.

The youngest Scion had adroitly stepped behind Dana and Janeka as Dolph's gate into the mortal world was opening up. A soft wind picked up in a swirl the black all-colored ichor from Chronus's wounds into three vials.

Chronus started laughing even as Sheila pocketed her purloined blood of a greater Titan.

"You are a cunning breed. I look forward to when I meet you in your time, children of the traitor gods," Chronus shouted out at them while still laughing.

"Come on! I can't keep this open forever," the tallest demigod called out.

The others all dashed through and Dolph walked out last, letting the portal crumble even as dozens of fluid appendages flowed over the edge of the pit and grasped at the closed opening.


	5. Flashback to the Past

**Chapter 14: The Ancient World**

Dana stepped out of the portal from the Underworld and immediately scanned around for possible enemies.

"Dang, this is cold," Janeka complained as she pulled up her hoodie over the tight black braids that covered her head.

"We're way north," the half-Asian demigod called out. "Which makes sense as it was Dolph's portal. Vikings ho!"

Sheila rolled her eyes at his antics even as Dana gave her a flat glare. She winked back at her cousin, as she had not thought she could pull that snatch of ichor without the keen-sighted daughter of Artemis spotting her. "So now what? We are basically stranded in the past. And I'd rather not do standard time travel back to our time in the future."

Tsukyo gave her a confused glare, as he figured she was saying something obtuse.

"Yeah, I'd hate to wait several thousand years for our own time. That would suck," Janeka clarified for him.

Dolph just slapped Tsukyo on the back. "Yeah, doing without TV for ten thousand years might annoy some of us."

The young half-Asians' expression was comical. "Oh no, we have to get back. Survivor and Lost are on."

Janeka started rubbing her head as she fought off a headache. "Right."

The daughter of Artemis suddenly spun to look off to the north, among the pine trees. "I hear someone calling out for help."

"A rescue! Away we go!" Tsukyo shouted as he took off at full speed, the three Dodekatheon cousins a mere moment behind him.

Dolph took off running at his best speed, but was by far the last to show up.

Over the top of a hill were eight giants throwing boulders of burning coals at a young man in the tunic and furs of an ancient Norse. Their laughter was cut off as Janeka's hand-cannon exploded the final boulder.

"Yo, ugly, why you picking on this guy? He do something to upset you?" the dark-skinned daughter of Ares shouted out in Ancient Norse.

"Soft-landers. The time of Fire is coming, as Ymir is dead. No more Ice shall exist," the Fire Giant called out.

Ice formed in Dolph's hand, turning into a spear. With a roar, he threw it at the Aesir's ancient enemies.

The effect of the ice spear slamming home was quite shocking to the flame-bearded giant, causing the fifteen foot tall giant to roar in anger and fear.

"Sorry, no Ragnarok today. How about'cha just run?" the daughter of Ares shouted out as she started to fire on them.

Bullets and sickle struck home instantly, even as Dolph and Tsukyo charged into melee. The giants seemed stunned and shocked, quickly falling back or collapsing from the wounds that the young demigods struck upon them.

The young Viking charged in, brandishing his long dagger to little effect. "Not so brave now that you don't outnumber me eight to one, ha!"

It was only a matter of moments for the giants to realize they were sorely outmatched and quickly fled.

"Yah! And take that!" the young man called out. "My thanks. I thought I was going to be killed. I thought I knew of all the gods, but you are surely unknown to me?" He was, the girls noted, nearly as handsome as Dolph and Tsukyo.

"I am Dolph, son of Hel and an Aesir," the tallest demigod called out. He cut a dashing figure in his (nearly) skin-tight Nemean leather armor, long blond hair and the blood-tipped spear in his hands.

"Hel? Of the... Underworld? I did not think she could know of love or having a child," the young man said in mute shock.

"Yeah, I get that at times. She doesn't win Mother of the Year award. Ever." Dolph's mouth was turned down in a grimace as he clenched his fists so hard that the cartilage in his knuckles popped.

"Hi, I'm Sheila," the youngest demigoddess called out to the young viking. She gave a little wave.

"Einaer be my name," the young man replied with a grin. "Thanks for the save. You guys just jumped right in."

"Of course we did. It's what heroes do," Janeka said with a snort of frustration.

Dana just gave a smirk even as she continued to watch for the giants in case they returned.

"So what are you doing out here? Those fire giants are kinda dangerous," Tsukyo said, trying to chat up the pretty young man. "Not to us, of course. But we're kinda working hard at the combat thing."

"I was trying to recover a shield that young Heimdal lost during a raid. I managed to sneak in, but they spotted me. Just as you spotted us, thank Odin," the young viking noted.

Dana looked over at Janeka, raising an eyebrow. The terse shake of her head was all the response she had expected. "So why don't you tell us the real reason you were here? Because that story... it has some holes."

Einaer blinked, then started laughing. "Oh, you guys are much quicker on the uptake than most of the Aesir."

"Huh?" Dolph asked in confusion.

"You aren't answering the question," Janeka noted as she kept her pistol out.

The young viking laughed even as his form seemed to flicker and then became a tall woman with amazing, dirty blonde hair. "It seems I've been unmasked on my little expedition to see this strange thing that happened. Odin had bidden me to come to this place, to see and judge one that could travel the grim realms of the land of the dead." Her beauty was literally inhuman, getting pangs of jealousy from the females while Dolph and Tsukyo were a bit surprised to see that she well over-match them, as she was like a godly distilled super-model that could make the simple tunic and trousers look better than anything they remembered in their far off future. "Well met, I am Sif. And soon to be wed to Thor Odinson."

The five scions all shared a quick look.

"Well met, Lady Sif," Dolph said seriously. "I do hope the animosity between Thor and my grandfather won't stand between us."

"Such a polite child. You are only in your first or second century?" the comely sometimes-trickster goddess asked.

"Just turned eighteen years," he replied in a bemused tone.

Sif blinked and then looked at all of the other. "Eighteen years since your mother visited you and proclaimed your divine nature?"

"No, that's like four months. I'm, uh, eighteen years old."

There was a long, uncomfortable silence except for the wind in the grass and trees.

"Oh, how cute!" Sif then reached over and pinched his cheek on the slightly taller boy. "Are you all younger?"

"Some of us are a little older, Sheila is the youngest at eleven years old," Janeka explained carefully as she tried to stifle a giggle at the put-out look on the big Aesir's face.

The golden-haired goddess looked over at the daughter of Athena. "My, you're going to be fairly tall."

Sheila winced as Janeka's expression darkened while Dana and Tsukyo just grinned. "Thanks. I think."

"Well, I have to be off. I have to tell Odin that you were just leaving the Underworld." With a wink, the goddess faded away into the grass.

"Huh. I wonder if it is because Loki hasn't done all his tricks yet?" Janeka muttered. "I kinda vaguely remember that Sif was a bit of a trickster herself when she was younger."

Everyone thought that it was quite odd to deal with such young gods.

* * *

><p>They had been traveling at a rather sedate pace south to Ancient Greece, occasionally fighting monsters or helping the random villagers. They almost had to run from an immature Hekatonkheire, but with quite a bit of teamwork had managed to rip up and shred the twenty-five handed amorphous creature. They had to make an emergency set of hand-sickles for Tsukyo, as punching did absolutely nothing to the formless creature.<p>

"I don't think I've ever seen anyone actually kill one of those before," a light-hearted female voice said as a goddess appeared at the end of a rainbow, her golden wings on her shoulder flapping a little bit as they folded up.

"Greetings, Iris; messenger of the gods," Dana said respectfully as she bowed to about forty-five degrees. The rest of the band quickly matched her.

"Quite the charmer," the goddess of travellers and messengers said softly. "Zeus commands your presence, so prepare yourself."

With a snap of a finger, Dolph and Tsukyo quickly purged their appearance of grime. Sheila scrunched her face in concentration, willing the icky dirty feeling away. Her ichor nearly burned in effort, but she felt something 'give' and then she suddenly felt as clean as if she had just stepped out of a shower.

"Ooh. If you can do that, you can probably disguise yourself pretty well too. I'll have to show you some marvelous tips and tricks, darling." Tsukyo gave her a quite (literally) sunny smile.

"I can change the basics," the youngest scion noted, willing her hair to change to a deep brown.

Dana nodded. "It's a handy ability." It sure made infiltrating the mafia a lot easier.

"Hold on to your sandals," Iris called out. She pointed to an area in front of her as a blinding portal of light appeared. "For you are about to enter the realm of the gods."

The five heroes stepped through into a too-real valley at the base of a mountain that seemed to never end, even when you could see the very top peak with a massive Greek palace. Though, to describe it as 'merely' a Greek palace did it a great disservice. Instinctively you could tell that this was the template that kings and architects would strive (and fail) to emulate for millennia, a perfection of form that was unearthly in concept and stature.

Iris led them up the stairs of marble as eagles flew over head. Dana frowned as she realized that her sense of time was imperfect here, as it seemed that instead of a value or constant of physics, that it was more an accomplishment of action to continue into the lower city of the gods; Olympus. Myrmidons and lesser gods watched the strangers in their midst with interest and a bit of caution. Everyone had a cup of nectar in their hands, as a celebration was under way.

Sheila kept her eyes open as she took in the varied homes of the gods. Apollo's temple of healing, Ares' training grounds, a pleasure palace for Aphrodite and Athena's library were all noted and catalogued. But they finally arrived at the palace of Zeus and Hera, king and queen of the Olympian gods. The massive, pillared edifice was quite a bit more colorful than was popularly portrayed. Painted, near-lifelike statues stood at attendance.

And in the main, open-air hall lay the gods of Olympus as they lounged on comfortable reclining klinai as servants brought them food and drink.

"Lord Zeus, King of the Gods, I bring you the strangers that you ordered here. They accepted your command with grace, even those of the far off lands of the Aesir and Amatsukami," the goddess Iris declared at the entrance as she bowed.

Dana immediately went to one knee as she seamlessly fit herself into the unusual social paradigm here. Sheila and Janeka were only a step behind her, while Dolph narrowed his eyes and then bowed stiffly.

Tsukyo... smiled and waved. "Hi!"

The Dodekatheon laughed at his antics, though the more perceptive noted the wince from his companions. It appeared this was his normal behavior.

"Welcome and well met," the bearded god declared from his klinai. Zeus's fit form was covered in an ancient toga that seemed to be woven of golden clouds. "Declare yourselves and your allegiance."

The youngest scion noted that Athena had recognized them, along with Hera and Hermes.

"I am Dana, adopted daughter of Artemis; demigoddess and visitor from a far off land," the tall and mediterranean woman said.

For a second, Janeka did not say anything, then realized she was next as the second oldest. "Janeka, daughter of Ares," she declared as she glared at the god of war.

Ares coughed up the nectar he had been drinking, spewing across to the deformed form of Hephaestus. "What!"

"I am Sheila. I believe I am the adopted daughter of Athena," the young blonde stated simply.

Hera had been frowning at Dana's announcement, but grew truly thunderous as the last Dodekatheon announced her lineage.

"Dolph, son of Hel of the Aesir," the almost giant demigod called out loudly and with force.

"Hi again, I'm Tsukyo the son of Susano-O of the Amatsukami," the Asian demigod called out.

"Husband? Why should we trust such unknown people? They could be traitors like Ixion who thought himself above his station," Hera demanded of him coldly.

"We are celebrating a great victory in our war against the Titans, Sister-Wife. We should not have such dark thoughts this day," the King of the God said as his brow curled in confusion. "New demigods to aid in our fight should be welcomed!"

"Father, time is but barely settling. As I do not remember adopting any child, it is possible they are still from some unformed time," Paellas Athena noted as her keen gray eyes studied the three teens. "I would suggest that we test them."

"But first, let them rest and drink and eat, so that we may discuss such weighty matters on the morrow," Zeus ordered. He clapped his hands and several nature spirits (nymphs, dryads and such) all appeared with smaller, less ornate klinai for the visitors.

The feast continued as they carefully sampled the food and fare of the gods. Hermes was quite winsome, trying to wheedle out information from where they came from.

"We were investigating the trail that led us to these lands," Janeka carefully hedged.

Dana turned her dark eyes to look at the goddess Athena. "It's actually quite amazing who we found at the end of the trail." Her nostrils flared for just a second even as the goddess of wise war frowned ever so slightly.

Her supposed daughter's head snapped up to take a quick look, then nodded ever so slightly to herself.

"Kinda thought so," Janeka said while nodding her head. "But with time being so unstable, who knows when we will meet up with them again."

Hera had been listening closely to the trio. "So, adopted daughter of Artemis, who was your natural father?"

"I really was not told," Dana replied carefully. "More important matters precluded worrying about such a trifling issue."

The severe looking goddess (who was still beautiful, mind you) nodded as if that confirmed everything. "And 'supposed adopted daughter' of Athena?"

"I believe that there are enemies that might be able to take greater action with a full acknowledgement. Or that the uncertainty might play into a guiding plan. It was fairly obvious, just never directly confirmed, grandmother," Sheila stated simply and then gave a simple nod.

"Yet I would not be your grandmother if she is indeed your mother," the Queen of the Gods said in a slightly too sweet tone.

"Not at all. You are Queen Mother of Olympus. You mere position venerates you in that with your Brother-Husband, as is your due," the youngest girl replied winsomely.

"You have a marked intensity to your words, like there is more to them than you say," Hera replied.

"I could not do justice to the relationships I am sure you are forging with all of your kin, as I'm only eleven years old." After just a second, Sheila continued. "Well, and about four months since I was visited."

Hermes and Hephaestus made noises of startlement at that, slapping their hands down on their klinai. "So very young," Hermes stated. "She almost matches mine own birthday and even the... hectic day of your own, dear Apollo."

The almost sun-bright god of manly love nodded with a casualness that surprised those present. "Yes, this day really is exceeding what I had learned from Pythia."

Zeus gave a crooked grin at that. "And why did you not tell us of this latest prophecy?"

"Even as those foretellings go, it was a bit vague. Though I expected other heroes to present themselves. Unknowns that shall shine as brightly as the gods in a great war just bespeaks questions with no answers," Apollo replied carefully. In truth, he thought he would that Hercules again.

"As great?" Ares sneered. "I doubt our two daughters could fight in any worthiness."

Janeka looked fit to be tied, but just grinned dangerously. "Well, in our land the ability to fight is usually linked to intelligence." Butter couldn't have melted in her mouth at her supposedly simple comment.

"Bah, what a land of weaklings," the angry god of war declared as he crushed his mug.

"But there are so many forms of war that can be waged if you are creative, uncle," Sheila said with tightly controlled anger.

"Perhaps someday we can see you practice against each other. It should prove illuminating the type of land when you come from," Athena noted casually

"Perhaps. Though it looks like Dolph has discovered something he can get drunk on," Janeka replied while taking note that goddess did pick up on what was going on.

"I'm not that drunk," the big Aesir slurred.

Dionysus laughed at the too-handsome blonde Norse. "Methinks you are, but Aphrodite and Apollo have not finished their wager, so we can drink a bit more."

Sheila's eyes widened at that, as the pair looked up from the dice they were rolling in between. "I guess he's... popular."

"Yeah," the nearly black-skinned daughter of Ares said in a tightly controlled voice.

"Never been popular before. Who knew being handsome was all it took?" Dolph said with a big grin on his face.

"Hey, what about me?" Tsukyo asked.

"I'm sure they will come to an equitable solution for two such handsome young men," Athena said with a sigh and a roll of her eyes.

"At least some of the younger among us have some self-control," Hera said while stealing a glance at Athena.

The three young demigoddesses were the only ones present that noted the slight smile upon the Queen of the Gods as she said this.

Sheila was going over what she knew of the goddess, but realized that for all of her spite and hatred for Zeus's illegitimate children, she had never heard anything that Hera had done against Athena. And it could not be that Athena was female, for Hera had tried to keep Artemis and Apollo from being born.

Or had never been noticed taking out her venom upon her. Sheila rubbed her chin as she thought, then made an overly surprised face. "Say, uncle Hephaestus? How would you go about improving one of your Golden Servants?"

Hera hid a frown, but turned her attention from the wretched child of Athena. If she was interested in her deformed son's creations, she was obviously no threat to her. The strange daughter of her favored son drew her attention with her ribald humor.

"Oh? What are you looking to improve?" the stunted god of the forge asked curiously.

"Well, to make it better and faster at assisting Janeka in making things," the youngest scion replied glibly. About five minutes into the fascinating discussion of how to give life-like thought using gears and cogs, she slipped in her low-voiced question while Hera was distracted by a boast from Ares. "Say, I heard you had an encounter with my mother that may have not gone to well. Could you describe to me those few days before and after? I have a hard time believing that you two had such a problem, considering you only seemed to have a friendly rivalry around making things."

Hephaestus narrowed his eyes as he studied the girl. This was certainly not the sort of question he expected of the young girl. "Why are you curious? Do you wish to have me say my follies?"

"I'm just trying to see if there is a pattern there," the youngest demigoddess said blandly.

The smith pursed his lips in thought, then his seared brow curled down as he actually considered what she was asking. He then turned his stupendous mind and started to spin the story as he remembered, including his attack on Athena after he thought her to have agreed to his advances. He gave a shrug at the end, as if to say 'I'm not sure what I was thinking.'

Sheila then asked him some questions, seeming innocuous and curious. About how he felt during the attack. After the attack. What items he had been crafting in his forge. Who they ended up being used and who still had them.

"Thank you for allowing me to get your side of that story," she finally said.

His dark eyes studied her, then he nodded. "You are welcome." He was starting to take apart the conversation and what she could think to gain from it. The only hint of a pattern he saw was Hera manipulating things. More than he had thought of before. And that was not a pleasant thought.

Dana leaned over to Sheila just a minute later. "You are playing a dangerous game."

"No, cousin, I'm finding I'm in the middle of someone else's game," the young blonde noted softly.

Brown eyes met her blue-green as the daughter of Artemis slowly nodded her head in agreement.

"What are you two talking about?" Paellas Athena asked as she walked over from where she had been listening to Aphrodite had been asking her some questions.

"Oh, we are just seeing some very interesting interplay between the gods. This is my- no, our- first time in Olympus," the older demigoddess said. "It's been illuminating."

"Indeed? I would like to speak to my supposed daughter for a bit," she declared imperiously, gesturing for Sheila to follow her out to an overlook. She doffed her helm and set it on the edge. "So what were you really doing there?"

"Perhaps discovering that Hera might have been... adjusting things to suit her wishes in bedeviling Zeus's progeny from other women," Sheila replied after a long moment.

"I have thought that might be possible. But I am more than a match for her in that contest," the goddess said confidently.

"Even if she was just trying to make sure you had the worst experiences with men and would never want to have any of your own children?" the girl asked with an arched eyebrow.

"She can not affect my desires in any meaningful manner," Athena replied very confidently.

That left Sheila quite a bit to think about later that night. "Truly, but... I get a sense of something from some of the tales. Perhaps I'm just imagining things, but my mind and my keen insight-"

The gray-eyed goddess interrupted her with, "Keen insight? Like my half-sister Artemis?"

"Yes, indeed. You are wise, of course, revered that way by many people," the young demigoddess explained as she noted that Athena was not able to quite hide her satisfaction at the pronouncement, "but I believe I was raised to be more tactical to be used in your strategy. I know you forced my parents to not only stretch my mind, but to excel in athletics. I assume that was to be a prelude to combat training when I got a bit older."

"I can see that. So you have surmised that I know that you are from far beyond what the others believe. Not just the turbulent snarl of this time, but a far off future." Athena seemed pensive as she studied the dangerously insightful girl in front of her.

"You were not really very surprised at seeing us. And Dana admitted that we were tracking your future self here. So she must have told you about us." Sheila nodded as she saw Athena's lips tighten at the accurate summation. "I wonder if we were led there by you so that I could gather my own sample?"

"Mayhap." Athena seemed to study her very closely, but the girl was not that easy to read at least with her level of insight. With that, Athena turned and left, gesturing to a dryad to take her to a room to rest for the night.

* * *

><p>The next morning (after rescuing a few of their belongings from a prank from Hermes) the young demigods found themselves in front of Zeus and Hera upon their thrones.<p>

"Whispers upon the winds say that a dark tide is rising in Atlantis, but that is all it is, whispers," Zeus declared. "But in this time where the war against our parent Titans is almost finished, they grow desperate."

"All of the younger gods have sworn to defeat and bind our progenitors," Hera explained as she sat with perfect poise. "We direct you to discover who, if any, are traitors to their oaths among the masters of the seas and oceans."

"Um, we're a bit unfamiliar with Atlantis or its location," Dolph finally said.

The leaders of the Dodekathon showed their surprise at this.

"And here I thought Atlantis and its traders were known all over the world," the King of the Gods said with a laugh deep in his belly.

"Their nearest trader enclave is south and east of the land of the River Nile; the lands of the Pesedjet on the coast of the great ocean in the south and east. That is the closest place where you could seek to visit their lands. Just beware, they are an open and friendly people to those that do not threaten their own. But they are fierce warriors in their own, sea-strange way," Hera said as she leaned forward on the lavishly encrusted throne at her husband-brother's side.

"So we have to find proof and bring it back to you?" Janeka asked in a curiously smiling way.

Sheila raised her eyebrow as she looked at her cousin. "I guess we're on our way," she replied carefully.

Zeus raised his hand to wave them away, sending them on our way.

"This is going to be easy," Tsukyo crowed. "I mean we already know they did something so bad to be written out of history and bound beyond space and time in the underworld."

The youngest scion shook her bob of blonde hair. "Maybe. I think that if we were known to have discovered their treachery that someone might have recognized. We might not get proof for decades."

"Hadn't thought of that," Janeka thought aloud as she played with her Chaos Watch. "Well, we got useful future knowledge, let's get the most out of it."

Dolph nodded. "Sounds about right."

At the back of the group, Dana shook her head. She should not be surprised, this is about what passed for a plan with this group.

Athena approached Sheila out in Olympus before they reached the first gate, even as Ares went to his daughter. "Sheila, do you need anything to help you in your quest?"

"No, though we know almost nothing of Atlantis," she admitted carefully. "Some things come to their conclusion in good time." She had said it in a very bland way.

The goddess nodded as if it answered her question. "So why not claim to have resolved it already?"

"We don't know for sure the chain of events. We may be stuck in a predestination paradox or may be creating a new, alternate time instead of the heroes that were sent. Maybe they died, but we will live?"

"Weighty thoughts on such an ephemeral thing known as time. It seems like it is well understood by you."

"We have only had clues and crumbs to work with. Which is good, without that... we would not be here."

Athena's triumphant smile told Sheila what she needed to know. The Goddess of Wisdom was not even telling herself what her plans were. And that could be for a dark reason indeed.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 15: The Dark Continent and Beyond<strong>

It had been a few weeks since they had departed Olympus and what would be (or is?) Greece. The three girls had blandly suggested that they avoid Egypt, as the Dodekathon were never terribly popular there. They might actually be before that time, but with the way that time was only settling down slightly, they decided to avoid any possible complications.

"So we don't know when we are exactly because time was never stable in the far past?" the young son of Susano-O asked as they stopped for the evening.

"Yeah. And it actually answers a few questions I had about that time travel equation I... we... had been working on. Time didn't use to go anywhere, it was a whole bunch of confused currents in a body of swirling water. But the gods must have decided that it was too dangerous to leave it like that, because the Titans that could use time would be able to easily set up a paradox and free themselves," Janeka explained as she pulled back her shish kabob with meat and vegetables that Dana had gathered earlier. Rabbit was surprisingly good.

Dolph nodded from where he sat on the opposite side of the campfire as he chilled his cooked strips of meat. "Makes a sort of sense. Heck, even explains why some of the legends talk about gods and heroes when they are younger but are only heard of far later."

The dark-eyed huntress Dana nodded. "So there's this whole wiggly mass of time that is being pulled from the past into a river of time, becoming more linear. But only after thousands of years."

"That sounds complicated. So that equation was that hard because time is so messed up in the past? So the now that we are in might not be the past that a lot of people remember?" Tsukyo really did feel a headache develop.

"Exactly. The fact that we aren't universally famous in the far off future is either because we died spectacularly or that we did not do much to gain a great legend. We could try to change that, setting ourselves up as heroes of greater legend than even Gilgamesh or Hercules. It's technically possible, but we would probably change the future so greatly that small things like the United States of America don't exist," the youngest girl present said before she took a bit of her kabob.

"I don't suggest we do that. So we try to be subtle-like and not derail the next ten thousand years of history. That way your TV shows don't disappear. Capisce?" the daughter of Ares said while pointing her skewer at the sixteen year old.

"Makes sense to me," he replied. "Not much else did, but hey. I'll just go with the flow."

* * *

><p>Al-Tanius, the Atlantean trade station, was a fairly large sized port town on the eastern edge of Africa across from the island that would become Madagascar. The band had arrived earlier in the week and had discovered that the next ship was several weeks away due to the time of year and the weather. Supposedly Atlantis was famed for its advanced sailing ships, but these heroes were not going to wait that long.<p>

Sparks flew from Dolph's impromptu forge as he hammered pins and nails. He had swam through the ground to personally harvest the iron from deep within the ground. While he worked on the metals, Tsukyo and Dana gathered lumber that Janeka and Sheila were turning into planks with the assistance of a Golden Servant. The simple labor of Janeka's sentry robots was actually help keep the speed of the project as fast as the demigods could all work together.

The locals had watched as the five strangers had taken over a section of the beach, mostly in derision as they could not believe anyone would build a ship faster than just waiting for the next one. But only for the first hour. This sixty foot ship was already mostly complete, stunning them with the inhuman flurry of action as the double-masted ship came together.

"Still need sails," Janeka complained on the sixth day.

"I am just waiting for some clouds from the next storm. Should be there tomorrow," her youngest cousin promised. She shaded her eyes and looked off to the west. "I might head up to those hills to get a better vantage to watch for clouds." Which would be better than wasting her power flying around.

"Keep your radio on when you head out," the eldest cousin called out. Dana's eyes were watching the dark-skinned people of Africa that mingled with the more pale (though no less scantily dressed) Atlanteans of the city.

The next morning, the daughter of Athena ran over the ground to the hills to the west like some supernatural gazelle or panther. So when she failed to reach her vantage she had picked out earlier in over an hour, she stopped to try and figure out her location. And could not.

Her preternatural senses pushed to their utmost, trying to see what trap she was stuck within. The only thing that stood out was that her path had led her past bushes and trees that happened to have spider-webs with a spider at exact center.

She wandered over to the nearest web, stretched three feet between the trunk and the ground. "Hello, little eight-leg," she said as she used her finger to lift the two inch wide spider off the web. "Are you an emissary from Athena or Anansia?"

"Aren't you worried about being trapped in my web?" the spider asked, startling her slightly.

"I am not hurt, yet, only inconvenienced. Yet why do trick me into staying here?" she asked as politely as she could manage.

"A test that might save you, young demigoddess. This journey you are on is dangerous and the Fates do not foresee you succeeding," the African god in spider form stated.

"That is possible. We have even factored that into this time and place," the young girl replied as she took in all the features of the small spider.

"Do you so believe in yourself over a god that has taken an interest in you? That is trying to help?" Anansia demanded of her.

"That is quite flattering. My mother has an noted relationship with spiders, but it is... not necessarily considered a good thing. I do not mean to offend your pride-" she was saying with as soothing of words as possible.

"Yet you do. Little demigoddess... too-young child... Why do you spurn my trick that would save your life?" the god said as he grew to the size of a baseball and held on to her held out hand. His pincers worked angrily as it chittered.

"I am merely making my own decision, based on all I know, cunning Anansia. Fate and Prophecy can bind one if you put too much faith in it. I seek to fit myself into the pattern in such a way that I am not stuck in predestination too badly." She gulped slightly, as she was not the best at hiding her emotions.

"Yet you did not seek to fight my trick. Rather, you sought me out to discuss it. To bypass the trick." That seemed to annoy the god more than the fact she did not wish to seek to listen to him.

"Yet isn't the first thing to do to bypass such a trick is to change the rules, to not just blindly follow the rules that are set or divined? A contest that is usually set to the strengths of your foe may be against your own weaknesses," she noted as worry crept into her voice.

The spider had grown to the size of a large dog, yet had not released its grasp on her hand at all. "You have not taught anyone this?"

"Ah, no. Yeowch!" Sheila stared blankly at the trickster god and the swelling bite mark. "Is being smart and crafty really worth a death sentence?"

"You will not die of my bite, though it has a curse. Speak of your teachings and I will curse you to always have a weakness to spiders, daughter of the virgin war goddess," Anansia stated in an alien, cold voice.

"How pleasant," she replied faintly, her sarcasm that she had picked up from Dana far too apparent.

Anansia melted into hundreds of spiders that rained onto the ground and then departed in a scattering wave.

Sheila frowned at the situation, but continued to move along as she traveled up up to the hills. The evening was a bit chilly, but that was exactly why she had come here. Tsukyo caught up to her by midnight, as Janeka had thought no one should be alone.

In the morning, they both pulled down a fluffy cloud from the sky and turned it into cloud-silk sails with their power to control the sky and storms.

"That was fun. I don't usually get to help in the crafting stuff," the son of Susano-O admitted.

"Creating things is a useful skill." Really, in Sheila's mind, it came down to the matter that relics and technology were great equalizers. How could you not work with such things if you wanted to succeed?

* * *

><p>Dolph spun the wheel lightly, changing his heading to get the best of the tail wind to catch the two masts of sails. While their Columbia was not a huge boat, it had a lot of more advanced features than you would think with its clipper-style sails and out-riding hulls for stability. Along with the mechanical rachets and pulleys, it required just a fraction of the crew that most ships would. Which was good, because even with Janeka's little mechanical minions, they had a lot of work.<p>

"Ship ho!" Dana called out from the Crow's Nest platform up seventy feet into the air. "I think it is Atlantean."

The massive ship hove over the horizon, trying its best to catch up to them. Dolph grinned as he called out a switch of sails and then raced towards them.

"Drop sail!" Janeka called out, directing Sheila and Tsukyo to lower the sails so they could slow down to the huge ship's ponderous size.

The Atlantean ship was made of dark wood with bronze cappings. It shared a few similarities with ancient Greek and Egyptian galleys, having hundreds of rowers and two large triangular sails. The people aboard were all bronzed from the sun and wore mostly a type of loincloth and sandals. Dark hair seemed to be the norm with brown to black colored eyes.

"Strange ship, you intrude into the waters of Atlantis! Declare your intentions," the ship's mistress called out, a sturdy woman of forty years with sun-weathered skin and hard eyes.

"We seek to visit your land, as we have heard of great things from Atlantis," Dana called out, seemingly in total earnest truth while hiding any hint of deceit. "Would you escort us there?"

"Why did you not seek to travel upon one of our traders?" the Atlantean demanded.

"Too impatient," Janeka called out. "So we built our own ship and headed here." Her almost black skin glistened in the sun from her sweat.

The Atlanteans all looked at the finely crafted ship. Finally the captain called out, "And how long did that take you?"

"Only a week," Dolph replied with a wide, wide grin. "Some of us are very good at crafting."

"Very well. Let us travel to Atlantis where our leaders may judge your story," the female leader of the bigger ship called out.

The much larger Atlantean ship turned to catch the wind as whips cracked and the slaves started rowing again. The narrow, sixty foot long ship crafted by the heroes easily matched its speed, even without a single oar.

"Well, so far so good," Tsukyo noted as he locked down a ratchet. "We probably won't even have to use the engine or the cannon."

"Ixnay on that talking about that, Tsukyo," Janeka called out to him as she tore her gaze from the distracting sight of Dolph working. His muscles on top of muscles and a bare chest were playing havoc with her self-control.

Sheila was frowning as she studied the Atlantean ship. Slaves were a common thing in this time. There were few civilizations that did not hold servitude of those they conquered, but the slaves of Atlantis seemed somehow even less happy. The giant ship had several catapults, along with rows of archers at the ready.

What other secrets would they uncover of the race that had been wiped out from history's pages?

* * *

><p>By Tsukyo's reckoning, the great city on the northwest coast of the continent was almost smack in the middle of what would be the Indian Ocean. Gleaming white towers painted with geometric patterns in a wide, variety of colors rose up hundreds of feet, as major engineering marvel for a people that only had basic stone and concrete. The docks were as large and as deep as any ancient bay.<p>

It did appear that the Atlanteans were unused to others sailing into their lands, as naked children laughed at pointed at the Columbia as it came up to the dock. They started clapping as the outriggers pulled in and tight to the main hull.

The dockmaster was a priest who almost instantly divined that the demigods were far more than mortal. "Welcome and well met, children of the gods. How may we help you?"

"A matter of continuing to battle the Titans," Dana stated simply. Which was true but quite understated everything.

Janeka and Sheila were scanning the docks, taking in the large galleys and a truly horrible smell coming from what they assumed were the slave quarters. Everywhere they looked were the signs of a (relatively) high wealth and health for the era.

"Then you wish to present yourself at the Tower of the Temple. If you wish, I would be more than happy to escort you there." The elder Atlantean bowed deeply, then started to lead them down the grand, wide streets that could hand two carts side by side easily. A humid heat sat upon everything in a languid fashion, making the ancient mysterious Atlantean seem slow and calm.

The Tower of the Temple was the largest building in Atlantis. Over two hundred and thirty feet of rounded pillars and embossed with carvings of the Atlantean gods. As they came closer, the trio of Dodekatheon goddesses started to hear the quiet murmur of machines moving.

The main entrance opened into a great hall that was easily over fifty feet tall, filled with a strange clockwork-like machine in the center. Around the outside of the round room was a spiraling path that was barely five feet tall.

"Here lay the paths to divinity. The outer path is simple, just bow your head and slowly walk," the dockmaster explained. "Then there is the path of mystery, through the pattern of magic within the craft. It is much faster, yet requires a keen mind and an understanding of numbers." He pointed towards an area hidden behind the machine. "There is your goal, the holiest of holies."

Janeka and Sheila were both looking over the gears, pendulums and other clockwork mechanics.

"Race ya," the daughter of Ares called out to the younger girl.

The Atlantean priest of the docks opened his eyes in shock as the two girls dashed over to the nearest gears that were on their level, jumping up onto teeth of brass and bronze that could grind up a person.

The two geniuses were bending their burgeoning intellects in a sudden competition. There was a pattern to the gears, levers and pulleys that could be used as they scampered through the whole machine while it tried its best to lose or crush them.

"What are they doing?" Tsukyo cried out.

Dana was almost ready to start turning the air blue with curses. Why did they have to have one of their competitive butting of heads now?

"Again?" Dolph complained. "Man, it gets annoying sometimes." He reached out and started to follow his own path through the gears. His own intelligence was far greater than his too-handsome looks would make you think.

"Eh? He's doing it too?" the son of Susano-O exclaimed. To his eyes, the gears of the clockwork mechanism did not seem to hold any pattern. But, on the other hand, he was nimble and quick. He could probably just bull through.

Dana was the last, taking in a more mystical approach to the numbers. Not as nimble nor as keen of intellect, she was the most well rounded of the group.

Dark eyes studied the group of demigods, causing the goddess to smile in anticipation. Not one of them had bothered with the great path, which was not surprising. It was a lifetime's work to take, so not for those that were just visitors. The two girls were going to be here first, faster than she had thought any but the most tricky of gods could be.

Numbers, timing and runes flashed through the eyes and minds of the two daughters of war-gods, almost perfectly matched. Janeka seemed to be showing slightly more frustration as she pushed her speed even faster, nearly getting her foot caught in a gear-junction. She appeared in front of the imposing goddess a mere tenth of a second in front of her cousin. She gave the blonde girl a shit eating grin. "Better luck next time."

Sheila nodded slowly. "To next time."

They both bowed to the goddess in front of them as she raised her arm. "I am Demosia, goddess of the Hidden Moon. Speak of your purpose here, demigods of the Dodekatheon."

"We were sent her to root out a hidden threat from the Titans," Sheila stated simply, a truth that did not tell near enough. "We seek to aid the those who stand against the enemies of the gods." She knew she was not the best at keeping her face stoic, so had kept her head down slightly as if in respect. Every fiber of her being was stretched as she tried to speak carefully lest she be destroyed here for her impertinence.

"Strange that my ability to see that which is hidden did not speak of this first. You have a touch of the other gods, but somehow strange and far off in some unfathomable way." The Atlantean goddess of the moon frowned ever so slightly. "We appreciate that such a diverse group was sent and will not consider it an insult. It would be best remembered if the Gods of Atlantis ever sally forth to aid our distant cousins. I shall leave you in the hands of my child."

While they had been speaking, first Dana then Dolph made it up to the platform of Demosia. Tsukyo was last, bulling through on pure nimble and quickness to get through the four dimensional puzzle. Demosia summoned a glowing sphere and sent it flying away into the air.

"A messenger?" Dana noted as she was always watching for new spells.

"Yes, a spell that should have already delivered-" Demosia was saying when the sound of odd thump-boom interrupted. "Dorathi... not again." The goddess showed her first deep emotion, a frustration at what was occurring.

A whistling range through the air as the five demigods realized what they were hearing.

"Incoming!" the daughter of Ares shouted.

Demosia was surprised when they all started looking around.

"Five o'clock high right at us," Sheila then called out. They all dove sixty feet away as a contraption that looked like it would fit on a Buck Roger's set from the early 20th Century... if it was made of bronze and glass.

The whole platform shook as the ten foot long flight capsule arrowed through an open window and struck home.

"Dorathi..." Demosia muttered darkly.

"It worked," the sturdy looking Atlantean shouted as he kicked its canopy-hatch out. "Hmm. It didn't land very well."

"If you were not as sturdy as the great Tayian Oaks, you probably would have killed yourself ages ago. Son, these are visiting demigods from the lands to the north west. Please take care of them while I cast some spells." The tall mystic goddess looked incredibly frustrated at her child.

"Dorathi, I am Dana, adopted daughter of Artemis. These are my cousins Janeka, daughter of Ares and Sheila, daughter of Athena. The big slab of meat there is Dolph, son of Hel and lastly is Tsukyo, son of Susano-O," the oldest of the demigods (at twenty-three) said as a matter of introductions.

"Ah, good. I don't get to meet many of my peers," the young demigod said. "Mother and father try their best, of course, but I have to entertain myself at times. It makes for a lonely decade or two at a time." He stepped off the ledge and landed easily on the ground over a hundred feet below with a thud from the heavy impact.

"So I take it you are a couple of centuries old then?" Janeka asked as she carefully remembered what had been demanded of them by the guardians of fallen Atlantis.

"Two hundred and fifteen years old, yes. And still not a full god yet. It's like fate conspires against me," the terribly handsome and muscular demigod explained. His leather skirt showed burn marks and his bronze skin held a tinge from fire he used in his creations. His chest was as bare as most of the Atlanteans, perfect for their sultry and humid environment.

"Oh, you are a crafter also? Several of us have that sort of knack," the youngest Scion explained. "Dolph and Janeka are the most into that such. Dana has looked at crafting a relic or two while Tsukyo lives for dancing. I just dabble compared to them. Everything I make has to fit a specific need."

The older demigod laughed at that, even as he continued to make idle conversation back to his workshop across town. It was a fairly large, sturdy building that looked like an ancient warehouse turned into a loft apartment. While there was only one bed, it appeared that two people shared to give it a strange dichotomy of purpose.

Dana eyed the scrolls of magic and a clean, concise research desk covered in papers. It appeared that whoever used it had not been by recently, as a small layer of dust covered things. Dorathi's areas were cluttered with tools and half-finished projects that looked quite advanced. Gears, cogs, pulleys and levers were used in abundance, though no motivating engines seemed to work.

"I'm trying to figure out a way to harness fire for my inventions. I'm sure I can use the power within it, but the closest I've figured is fire to heat a spinning wheel. It's not as good as a water wheel though," Dorathi explained.

"I'm sure if you keep at it, you'll figure it out," Dolph said with a grin while shaking his head. He was impressed that the older demigod had come to the idea of a heat engine already. "I take it you have some dominion over fire?"

"Yes, indeed. I really want to take a long journey at some point to visit the forges of Hephaestus or the dwarves of the far north," Dorathi admitted as he showed them his workshop. It was basically an advanced smithy, with many ideas that other cultures would not consider for thousands of years.

* * *

><p>The ring of white-gold hissed as pure cold water from a deep well was poured over it. Janeka nodded even as she gestured at a cloth. "So the last thing to do is polish it. This shouldn't take long." She bent back over where she was adding a ring of bronze with silver screws to her Chaos Watch. "I can't believe we both had the same idea."<p>

"If we weren't manipulated into it. We believe Athena was the one that stole the Ichor temporis and both of us could not see letting something so unique go to waste," Sheila noted softly as she began to polish it while her ichor thrummed through her fingers, turning hours of work into just moments. "I'm just glad that Dorathi was willing to let us work on our relic crafting in peace."

Janeka gave her youngest cousin a quick, wide grin. "Got Dolph to distract him on working on his next version of the cannon capsule. They are having a bit of fun and it's not like anything they are gonna do is harm to them."

Sheila snorted at that. It had been a bit odd to discover that Dolph and Dorathi were tougher than granite.

The two continued on their tasks. Sheila's ring of Temporis was very basic, in all reality. Janeka had integrated her new relic into overly complicated looking wrist watch. Her Chaos Watch looked like an escapee from a Steampunk set and much of Janeka's mystical powers were tied to the item. Sheila's new ring, though, was separate and simple. Once she was done it would merely grant her the ability to synchronize with the powers of Time itself and could be hidden from sight.

In fact, as she finished it, she set it only her forefinger and willed it to disappear from normal sight. "Now if I only knew how to use any powers or what powers were there for use."

"Almost positive the first thing we'll get is an absolute sense of time." Janeka's watch was back on her wrist, where it would always return.

Blue-green eyes widened. "You are right. Weird. We really are on the edge of a tempest of time frames, with the chaotic waves of myth at our back and the slowly calming order of time before us."

Janeka blinked. "Faster than I expected." She concentrated hard, then suddenly she could feel the same thing as her watch tingled in a way that almost burnt her wrist. "Nice. Got it."

The demigoddess daughter of Ares left her Golden Servant to tidy up and they went looking for the rest of the group. Dolph and Dorathi were arguing over aerodynamics.

"That doesn't make sense. You are pulled upwards because of the resistance to the wind?" The Atlantean was having trouble with some of the more exotic aspects of a very modern science, though he was apt to pick it up very quickly.

"Yeah, seemed backwards until you realize that the wind is always resisting movement and you can use that to get the force direction upwards," Dolph was explained over a sketch on the ground. "Yo, Janeka. Heya munchkin."

"I'm not a munchkin," Sheila complained. "I'm taller than Janeka, you know."

"Don't remind me," the black teen complained. "I'm like seven years older than you. Say, Dolph? Where's Dana and Tsukyo?"

"I think they said they were going to explore the city near the temple," he replied blandly.

"We should track them down," Janeka decided.

"Sounds like a good idea. There are some slightly dangerous areas there," Dorathi said seriously. "Mother has been working on more magics to counter the Titans and that's near her Earthly abode. So follow me. I'm sure we can find them in no time."

The scions from the future hid their frowns. Luckily Dorathi was distracted so did not catch their guilty looks. They walked through the press of flesh, which was a phrase that Sheila had not fully understood until she had been stuck in this ancient past. It was amazing how inured you became to the human form in its unclothed manner. But, just like in future Africa, there was little need for clothing so modesty was essentially unknown.

Sheila's nose picked up Tsukyo's trail even as she discovered that Dana must have figured out a means of supernaturally masking her own. "Down that way," she called out, pointing down a cobblestone street. The youngest demigoddess was trying to figure the best way to lose their guide, but every way seemed blocked.

"Hmm. They aren't supposed to be in that area. The guards should have kept them out. Most high mother will have words with them later." The Atlantean demigod strode imperiously down the road to where six guards stood. "Move aside, I must try to find a few visitors that have wandered into the wrong area."

"You can not pass," the helmed captain of the soldier declared.

"I am the son of Demosia. Do not stand in my way, captain." The eldest demigod moved to brush past the guards, only to stop as he was pushed backward.

"Capture Dorathi, kill the intruders," the Titanspawn in human form order. He followed his own orders, snapping out a dagger at the sun-haired girl.

The blade missed as Sheila ducked backwards, missing her nose by mere inches. "These must be the threat we were told to discover." Her pistol appeared in her hand as she imbued it with implacable war.

Dorathi looked confused, his coffee-cream complexion darkening in anger. "Yes, it appears that something is greatly amiss." He almost jumped out of his sandal at the sudden and shocking gunshots from Janeka and Sheila.

Four of the five guard went down from supernaturally fatal shots to the chest, while the captain suddenly found himself impaled upon the Shovel. Each of the guard's features turned feral and their skin a deep red after their deaths.

"They are not human," Dorathi exclaimed in shock. "Come, I will get to the bottom of this matter." He strode through the carnage like a true prince of the gods, opening the locked portal. "Your friends must have been captured by this infiltrator group. Only the Atlanti can manipulate this lock to the warrens of the Tower."

Dolph carried all the bodies into the back, hidden entrance while Sheila used a concentrated blast of air to mostly clear the blood from the stone road. Janeka grinned, then winked as a burst of fire turned what little that remained into ash that was easy to blow away.

"I guess we're the anti-CSI," Dolph muttered with a dark chuckle as he set the bloody bodies in a pile.

"This way." Sheila kept an eye on the Atlantean demigod, but he truly did seem to be innocent of the dark secrets they were now plumbing. Half an hour later, quite a bit deeper into the warrens, she noticed that Dorathi seemed to be getting a bit nervous. "Is there a problem?"

The muscular demigod frowned. "I've never been down this far. I am afraid that your friends may have uncovered something truly dark."

"Your mother is the goddess of hidden things, isn't she?" Janeka noted.

"Yes, so that something could be here and for her to not be aware... is worrying." The Atlantean continued on his way, following Sheila closely on nimble feet.

Dana materialized behind them just ten minutes later. "You were attacked?"

"Titanspawn that were guarding the doors. Something is afoot and we must root out these spies," Dorathi immediately replied.

The masked daughter of Artemis nodded carefully. "Of course. That is why we were sent here by Zeus. I left Tsukyo at a barrier that we found."

They followed her down a side passage and yet another set of stairs, ever deeper in the clean stone corridors. Tsukyo was staring at a black wall at the end of a corridor.

"I was about to cast a spell here to see if there are any hidden glyphs," Dana explained as she pulled her shadow mask down around her neck. That let her swarthy, mediterranean skin be a brighter spot on her black combat-spec outfit. Words of magic were intoned as she opened her third eye.

And runes exploded along the walls.

"It's a trap!" Janeka shouted.

"Don't worry," Dorathi called out as he put his hand on the wall. "I can disarm it. It's just one of my mother's-" He stopped as only a small subset of the runes disappeared. "Ah, this could be bad."

The runes pulsed with an ancient power, older than Demosia. For the Goddess of the Hidden Moon had fallen sway to a Titan.

"I hate it when someone says that," Tsukyo exclaimed worriedly.

"Darkness so black I can't see. I think... no, I know that it leads into the Titan Realm of Shadows," the daughter of Artemis said as her perception took in the magical auras.

Sheila frowned. "But the way back is warded also. These runes call upon the Titans to lose or destroy the enemies of the caster."

"Yeah, I see that," the darkest skinned demigoddess noted.

"So we have to get lost in a manner that doesn't get us killed?" Tsukyo asked in confusion. "That's got to be impossible."

"No, he's right. Magic always has loopholes like this." Dana was scowling as she tried to decipher the runes. "Darkness, Location, Fire, Earth, Storm..."

"The elemental aspects of the Titans," Sheila mused.

"Which means that to escape, we have to travel through them. We need to find the least inimical aspect," Janeka noted. She shared a look with Sheila.

"Time. While being lost in time is death to any mortal, we aren't fully mortal any more," Sheila noted aloud. "And it may help us get so lost we get found." Mystical aikido!

Tsukyo looked confused, but Janeka, Dolph and Dana instantly figured it out. Dorathi frowned, as something seemed quite odd in that phrasing.

"That's probably harder than we think, but it's a good idea." Dana started to study the runes with her mystical insight. "We need to tie each other together follow me."

Janeka muttering something about being a good adventurer as she pulled the rope out of a small backpack she had. In just moments, they were quickly knotted together with a length of silk rope.

Dana traced her hand across a rune, then started to follow a path along the wall. The corridor and air turned gray as the air seemed to thicken and the the temperature dropped suddenly. Sheila and Janeka noted that it had been only a decade before the fall of Atlantis from when they had arrived. Decades turned to centuries as the wove a dangerous path down the corridor.

Without a turn, they were suddenly around a corner that had changed and in front of them lay a wall of ice that was barring their way.

"This is the end, if we can get past this," the daughter of Artemis said as she let her breath loose. It felt like she had been holding it forever as she strove against a fate worse than death.

"Ice I can handle," Dolph said with a grin. The huge Aesir reached forward and grabbed the ice as if it were soft balsa wood, fingers sinking deeply into it. His whole back flexed as he pushed forward and shattered forward as implacable as the ice was cold.

The skimpily garbed Atlantean frowned. "I'm lucky that I am sturdy indeed. This is more cold than I have ever heard of since the death of Ymir."

Dolph finally shattered the last of the barrier, revealing the underside of gears and pulleys. "We must be under the great hall."

"The great Puzzle of Life. It's stopped," Dorathi breathed out in a near panic. "It can only stop if Atlantis is fallen."

"Um, dude? It has," Tsukyo said bluntly.

"What!" the demigod of Atlantis nearly roared. His fists were suddenly clenched in pure anger.

"It's been fallen and forgotten for thousands of years, just like we remembered from our far future," Janeka said in a soft voice. "Not totally, but almost perfectly. All of the other gods threw down Atlantis and the Atlanteans for turning traitor and conspiring with the Titans. Atlantis was moved to the bottom of the world and covered in snow and ice."

"No. No! No! No-no-nonono!" Dorathi shrieked out, holding his head as if it were under great stress and shaking it back and forth.

"Hey, buddy?" Tsukyo called out.

As if a puppet had cut its string, Dorathi collapsed into catatonia.

"And so we returned the lost one to Atlantis only to destroy his view of his people," Janeka said sadly. "We didn't even have to lie. Is that fate?"

The collapsed figured rolled over onto his knees, his form shrinking and becoming more womanly. The woman who stood up (as all of the demigods scrambled for their weapons) looked very similar to Dorathi. Her voice, when she spoke, was deep and resonated with mystery and majesty. "Fate is a fickle mistress." Dark black eyes studied them all, seemingly unconcerned with their weapons, the cold or her state of dress.

"The hell?" Dolph asked the woman as he pointed The Shovel at her.

"Did not my other half speak of me? I am Voreth, daughter of Demosia and Demigoddess of Fire and Magic." She arched an eyebrow as she settled her long braids over her left shoulder.

"In one body? I guess I've read of weirder," Janeka said. "Dorathi didn't mention he shared a body. Nice bit of shape-shifting."

"Yes, we refused to be born without the other, even though it was prophesied that only one child would be born of our mother. Our souls bound to one body and we share," the Atlantean mystic explained. "Mother... what have you done?" She was looking down at the bottom of the great chamber, where a capstone with hundreds and hundreds of mystical symbols were engraved in the dark rocks. "She plumbed a truly forbidden secret this time."

Dana snapped her finger. "She hid you away, cast some spell so it was only Dorathi. I bet she suspected that if you were awake, you might spot her plans." Her ichor hummed in her body, telling her this hidden secret and truth.

Voreth nodded slowly, exhaled then looked at the fallen heart of Atlantis. Her breath wafted in the air like a cloud due to the very deep cold. "So where is Atlantis."

Janeka slipped out her computer. "Atlantis is now at the south pole, frozen over. Mortal believe that it has always been so, a neat trick of rewriting history." The screen was showing a world map.

"Let's get to the surface," Dana suggested. "I think I want to get home."

They decided that the easiest way was upward into the main chamber of the Puzzle of Life. Sheila and Tsukyo just floated up on the winds, while everyone else clambered and jumped. They discovered that Voreth was easily the least nimble, as she nearly fell several times. Dolph just leaped and climbed, using his prodigious strength to its maximum effect. Janeka held the poise of an olympic athlete with the dexterity that even the most nimble of cats would have been envious of. Dana seemed the most balanced of strength, nimbleness and toughness.

"All the openings are iced over," Sheila announced as she finished her survey of the main chamber.

"So we just bash some ice out of the way," the big Aesir called out as he moved to the nearest entrance and then started to rip away the ice with his bare fingers, totally unaffected by the cold. It seemed to try and resist him, but he was unstoppable as he pushed through the ice like it was slush.

Sheila had been watching this in interest, trying to learn a few tricks to the trade of using super-human strength when she realized that one of them was not doing so well. "Janeka?"

"What?" the black teen asked.

"You are slipping into hypothermia," the youngest scion stated even as a blast of super-cold wind cut through the chamber. There was the sound of tinkling off in the distance. Sheila's mind was frantically trying to figure out a solution, when it came to her. She slipped off her amulet. "Take this and try to understand the weather. Once you understand it fully, you can not be affected."

Janeka took it into her cold fingers, her fogged thoughts bending to the task. And all of a sudden, it wasn't as bad.

"Good idea," Dana said even as she bent her purloined Atlantean relic to healing some of the damage.

"I should have thought of that," Dolph said in frustration even as he slipped off his armband. It was far to0 big, but he slipped it on her arm anyways. "I'm sure you can figure out how to use my immunity to the cold."

The daughter of Ares nodded. "Thanks. I really needed that. Shee-ooot. Nearly froze to death and didn't even realize it."

Tsukyo was looking out into the darkness. It appeared as intimidating as any underworld. "So now what?"

"Now we-" Sheila suddenly frowned. "Janeka, I'm hearing a really odd time-date stamp from the GPS satellites in orbit."

"Say what?" Dark brown eyes were suddenly looking up into the sky. "Ah, shit. We missed, guys. It's 1981."

Voreth asked finally, "What does that mean?"

"Well, I guess we have a few decades to kill before the Titans get free," Dana replied as she looked into the dark of the Antartica winter.

"Palmer Station is only a couple of hundred miles that way. Or should we try to fly all the way to Argentina?" Janeka said as she pointed off into the direction.

"Let's take it one step at a time," Dana said, sounding quite upset.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 16: Brave New World<strong>

Lou Vinnet was checking his stash of chocolates in one of the storage rooms when he heard knocking at the outside door. "Mark, this isn't funny." He flipped on the outside light and cracked the door ever so slowly.

"Can we come in?" Tsukyo asked brightly at the front of the eclectic group.

"What the hell are you?" the scientist shouted.

Dolph reached over and slid open the door. "Thanks. Everyone in."

The six scions pushed in and closed the door behind them, shutting out the cold and darkness. Voreth looked distinctly uncomfortable in a set of Dana's shirt and pants.

"Hi, we were a bit lost and were wondering if we could look at calling for a ride out," Sheila explained as she shook off the snow off her head. Even with the immunity to weather she'd had, that had been rather cold.

"You just happened to get lost in the Antarctic?" Lou managed to get out in a strangled voice.

"Something like that, but a lot less believable," Dana said in a soothing tone, calming him down with her presence.

"Really? Huh. Well, I suppose we can talk to the boss." Lou shrugged and turned to lead them into the small base.

* * *

><p>Doctor Jill Sharps looking at the six strangers and then over to Lou. "They just knocked on the door and you let them in?"<p>

"What was I supposed to do? Lock them out and hope they froze to death?" the slightly portly Sicilian asked.

"No, I suppose not. Though I do wonder what you were doing in the Antarctic without shoes or winter gear," the gray haired professor asked.

"We took a wrong left turn past Atlantis," Janeka said with a wide grin, showing she was feeling much better.

"That was a horrible joke, Janeka." Dana looked like she was developing a headache as she kneaded her forehead.

"Well, I will have to put out a call and see if there are any ships out there that can get close enough for a pick up," Dr. Sharps said professionally. "We really don't have the supplies for another six people."

Sheila gave her a small, helpless shrug.

* * *

><p><em>HMS <em>_Broadsword_ cut through the waters far south of the Falkland islands, being sent to a rescue mission. It navigated the treacherous waters as the sharp-eyed sailors kept an eye (and other sensors) out for icebergs. But after a danger-filled three days, Royal Navy destroyer was finally close enough to take on the six passengers that claimed to be from America.

Not that anyone could find any records of them, but people were digging quite thoroughly. Harsh electric lights threw back the Antarctic night as the six people were bundled aboard.

Lt. Jeremy Williams snapped a salute. "You'll be bunking in here," he said, pointing to a small room with eight bunks. Several of the crew members were not very happy with that. "The captain asks if you would like to meet with her in the officer's mess."

"Sure," Dana said as the demigods quickly put their limited supplies in the lockers.

The lieutenant then led them through the cold corridors past saluting soldiers and into a small, stately dining room.

"Please, sit down. It's been a long time," the commander in her Royal Majesty's' uniform called out politely as she stood and bowed ever so slightly.

All of the 'modern' scions blinked at that. Sheila was the quickest on the uptake though and replied, "Ah, well it is a pleasure to meet you for the first time."

The woman's eyes widened slightly at that. "Really?" She seemed to be studying them all closely suddenly. "Yes, so I see. I am Commander Farness in this form, but you may know me better as Lady Brittania of the British Pantheon. Well met; cousins, sister and friends."

The three frowns that appeared on the three cousins was almost comical as they focused their intellect upon the task.

"It's nice to meet you Britannia," Janeka said casually. "So one of Athena's bunch?"

"Quick as always, Miss White. My youngest sister seems a bit flustered," Britannia said with a small smile.

"She's sometimes excitable, being eleven you know." Dana smirked at that, ignoring Sheila's glare.

"British Pantheon? How come I never hear about these things?" the young son of Susano-O asked in blatant confusion.

"Oh, you know, always learning new things is good. It does look like we are going to be doing some more travelling," Sheila finally said as she puzzled through things.

"Indeed. We are allies and comrades. If you wish, I can extend my protection over you," the British officer said in a soothing manner. "Other gods of this time may see you as a threat. And remember grudges you do not."

"Oh, yay. Sure, hit me," Janeka replied sarcastically.

Britannia touched her shoulder. "I put my mark upon you, cousin."

Dana was next, along with Dolph, then Tsukyo. Britannia frowned as she looked at Voreth. "I'm not familiar with your pantheon."

That got the proud Atlantean angry. "I do not need your protection."

Sheila coughed softly. "I will also not need your mark, sister. I must stand on my own two feet." She had also dredged up from her occult studies that the person that marked you could always have a sense of your location and safety. That intrusion into her privacy ranked high up with her competitive spirit to succeed no matter what.

"Well, that is your choice. Please, join me for supper and we can talk of things since our last battles as allies." Britannia smiled as she saw the three cousins start to decipher the words.

It was a splendid way to get to know the changes in time, Sheila decided. The youngest demigoddess came to the conclusion she even really liked her older sister. Finding out that Athena had directed Britannia, Columbia and Antoinette to be the patron goddesses of Britain, France and America was interesting.

Was she going to be expected to be a patron of some country?

* * *

><p>The 747 from Brazil landed in Las Vegas with a screech of tires on the asphalt, heat rising off the late summer dessert. Most of them welcomed the cool air conditioning of the long wait to go through customs.<p>

"Back home," Tsukyo said happily. "Well, sort of."

"We need some way to make some money," the very dark-skinned daughter of Ares said. "Which is why we're going to the City of Sin." They all had a bag of luggage courtesy of Britannia's contacts.

"Excuse me? Could you come this way?" a polite security guard for the airport said. "We need to verify your passport."

They all shared a cautious look (excepting Voreth who just looked frustrated) and followed him into a small conference room and then left them alone for ten minutes.

A new security officer stepped in and gave them all a glare. "Great. A nigger and a bunch of her demigod friends trying to sneak across the border here into the USA. Just got to love this job," he said snidely in a soft southern accent.

"Apple pie? So the American Pantheon," Dana deduced almost instantly. Her occult background was stretched as she tried to determine who this divine being is.

"Johnny Reb? A pleasure to meet you," Sheila said as her academic background came to the fore. "These are my cousins Dana and Janeka, the daughter of Artemis and Ares respectively. Dolph, the son of Hel and Tsukyo the son of Susano-O. Finally this is Voreth, the daughter of Demosia and I am the daughter of Athena." She held out her hand to shake his.

"Guess you might have a reason to be here. This your first time out of the United States?" the god of rebellion asked suspiciously.

"Essentially. All of us except Voreth are Americans. I guess we missed you heading out, which wasn't too hard. We were quite a bit less powerful then," Dana ad libbed perfectly.

"At least you ain't no damn Loa," Johnny groused. "Welcome back to America. Don't make me have to bother with you." He stood up from the conference tabled, muttering about hating his job as a glorified guard.

"That was different. Special bus different," Janeka said in a very tightly controlled voice. She seemed to be hanging on to her temper by the barest margins. "Makes me so proud to be American."

"So what are we doing here again?" Voreth interjected to distract the volatile situation.

"We're going to be getting enough money to live on and start a business," Janeka said with a crooked grin. "Only a couple hundred thousand apiece, okay?"

Sheila nodded carefully. This should be relatively straightforward.

* * *

><p>The youngest scion was pretending she was eighteen (taller and with darker hair) and was busy helping herself to about fifty thousand dollars worth of black and red chips. She had been casually moving through the crowded casino and different games. Unenhanced, supernatural senses and impossible nimbleness had allowed her to clean up at cards and the roulette wheel. Reading the cards off of different reflections had been a nice challenge.<p>

She saw Dana at a different card game, while Tsukyo and Janeka were playing with the different machines. Dolph had even managed to win with some careful use of his control over metals and a bit of intimidation.

Voreth looked quite exotic thanks to her features, though no one could quite place where she was from.

"Excuse me, miss? If you could come with me?" a man in a black suit said to her after she had reached one hundred thousand dollars (though she only ever showed about five thousand in chips at any one time).

Sheila looked up in apparent surprise. "Is there a problem?"

"The floor manager would like to talk to you and your friend." He was obviously casino security for the pirate themed business.

"Certainly. Voreth?" Sheila asked artfully.

"Coming," the Atlantean replied slowly. She was still adjusting to the strangeness that was the 'United States' and the mortal wonders of the age.

They boarded the elevator which went down, not up. Sheila tilted her head as she calculated how far down. At least thirty stories. Perhaps more. The door opened with a ding.

"Just go straight down the hallway. You can't miss it. I have to go back to the floor," the security guard said as he politely held open the door.

The young demigoddess was quite a bit tense as she stretched her senses as best she could in the confines of the concrete corridor. "I'm getting a sincere sense of danger, I think."

"You worry about the mortals?" the taller woman asked with an arched eyebrow.

The door opened silently, showing a large desk with a huge row of TV monitors behind it on a heavy rack. At the desk sat a thin, very pale man in an expensive suit, while in the shadows were a half dozen 'toughs' keeping at still as the dead.

"Your group is costing me a lot of money," the man said, his voice thick with a New York accent.

"A lot is relative, is it not?" she asked curiously. "We are just looking out for ourselves." Her dimples appears as she smiled. Janeka and Dana were moving on the screens, heading to the elevators. Tsukyo was tapping the biggest member of their band upon his shoulder to let him know and they started moving.

"Five hundred K. Half a million dollars. I don't like cheats," the owner of the Tropical Caribbean said in a snarl. "I don't know if you knew this was my operation or if you are just some hunters looking to deal with me as a problem..."

"As a vampire? I'm not terribly thrilled but I don't hunt your kind," the young blonde said casually.

Voreth frowned as she looked around a bit harder. "Undead. Do they burn?"

"Usually, but we aren't quite to that point of violence-" the youngest scion was saying.

"The hell we aren't." The vampire looked very inhuman at this point. "You came in here and used your supernatural means to cheat me of my money. So you are gonna pay. Boys!"

The vampires stepped into the light, pulling out guns except for the one that was nearest the boss. "Vinnie, there auras-"

"Shut your trap about their auras. They're gonna be dead and then they won't have an aura. Ventilate 'em!" the vampire owner shouted out.

All the guns roared as the vampires sought their end. Voreth raised her arms up to protect her head, trying to dodge and roll with the painful blows as best as possible, while Sheila disappeared in a blur even as her gun appeared in her hand.

"What the hell?" Vinnie shouted as he realized the strange woman was letting most of the bullets bounce off of her. The first vampire to die took two bullets to his head that blew it fully off even as a soft hiss started to fill the room.

Vinnie's lieutenant was frowning as he realized the elevator was coming back down. "Their friends are coming. This is going to be bad."

"Jimmy, shut up and start doing your job. I don't want them to leave this room alive- Mother's holy ghost!" Vinnie shouted as he came to his feet, somehow becoming even more pale.

A soft, golden flame had encompassed Voreth as she charged into melee, igniting two vampires with her fiery aura.

That was when the heavy, vault-like door to the room shattered with one punch. "Knock knock," Dolph called out even as he withdrew his fist and then pulled out his 'Shovel' from the shadows within thin air. "Oh, wraiths. I've got them." His too-beautiful visage had reverted to his terrifying face that announced to all that he was the Son of Hel; the son of a true monster.

Janeka, Dana and Tsukyo exploded into the room like they were shot out of a cannon in low, flat leaps. Tsukyo's first punch hit a vampire so hard his head exploded into fragments, sending dust to spatter against the wall. Janeka's hand-cannon was booming deafening thunder while Dana's silvery sickle divested two vampires of their heads.

Jimmy had his own gun out, though had actually not tried to shoot at any of the six people as they decimated the mobster vampires. "What is that big guy doing-!"

Dolph reached into thin air and pulled a wraith into view by grabbing its neck. With a muted roar, he snapped the ghost's neck, sending it wailing into the deepest parts of a harrowing. "Next."

Unseen to the rest, the wraiths that were present decided to flee for their unlives.

Vinnie's last enforcer died as Sheila kicked him so hard he bounced thirty feet even while shooting him twice, dusting him quite thoroughly. She skidded to a halt in front of the band of demigods.

"Not a big fan of people attacking my cousin," Janeka stated in a cold voice. "So what are we going to do with you?"

"The big guy is an idiot." Sheila pointed at the only other vampire present. "He, on the other, seems to be moderately intelligent."

Jimmy had the feeling that his intelligence was the only thing keeping him alive.

"Oh, yeah!" Tsukyo then sent a bolt of light that ashed Vinnie in one shot. "I forgot I could do sunlight for a second."

It was an act of pure will for the final vampire to not start trembling. "What do you want?"

"We're just getting enough cash to survive and then we'll be out of your way," Janeka stated. Her dark eyes looked almost like black obsidian and twice as hard. "Capiche?"

"Capiche." Jimmy dry swallowed. "Friendly advice, Vinnie had friends that might be annoyed at the loss of profits here."

"Undead thing, warn them that to attack the progeny of the gods... is unwise," Voreth declared. "Unless you wish to face off against demigods, you would be well served to never let us become aware of you again."

"Demigods?" Jimmy suddenly realized that they did not have faith, they were of a divine nature. The gold fire that lined their aura existed because of the pure nature.

They all turned and walked back out through the shattered door, leaving one vampire as a warning.

* * *

><p>Dolph whistled as he drove along the dusty road out to the warehouse they had purchase, looking around casually in the bright sunshine of the Nevada desert. The truck he was driving growled with deep power as he expertly pulled up to the front of the garage. His boots thumped to the dry dirt, sending a small cloud of dust to swirl around his ankles. The heavy box was lifted easily out of the passenger side.<p>

He nodded as he walked past the two normal men they had hired to work the garage that was attached to the warehouse. "How's it going, Devin?"

"Pretty good, boss. Just have to finish up that turbo-charger on the Pontiac and call the owner. Otherwise, pretty slow," the head mechanic said.

The huge teen just nodded as he unlocked the heavy security door and entered the cool interior of the 'shop' as they were calling it. "Yo. I got those parts you wanted, Janeka."

The black daughter of Ares looked up from where she was soldering at a very advanced workbench. "Thanks. I should be able to prototype my circuit so that the boys at Intel can see my work first hand."

The big man just nodded. "Dana still out and about?"

"Yeah, she's decided to make sure the local vampires understand that we are off limits. The ones from the business district and the casino seem to have gotten the clue, but the psychos that hang out at the raves seem to be a little slower on the uptake," Janeka replied as she took a moment to tie her handkerchief back over her tight braids. Of course, Dana was also hanging out with some of the local werewolves, though that was an uneasy situation.

"Where's Sheila and Tsukyo?" Dolph asked curiously as he walked over to an engine he was rebuilding. It was going to be a monster of power but with (relatively) high fuel efficiency.

"She's studying the markets to help with our investments in the office upstairs. Tsukyo is out at a tryout for one of the local dance troupes. And Voreth is still holed up in her room."

In just three months, the scions had carved themselves a niche here north of Las Vegas. With a broad set of patents and inventions, they were well on their way to setting themselves up beyond comfortable. Careful sounding out of the supernaturals had garnered only a scattering of information of the gods and titans. They had discovered that most of the supernatural of the mortal world had very little interaction with the divine and thought those that dealt with the older gods as a bit crazy.

"Well, she has ten thousand years of catching up." Dolph frowned as he picked up his wrench, thinking of the dwarf Dougal. Drinking buddy and appreciated a good car. He missed his crafting companion.

Janeka just nodded. "I expect to see Dorathi show up in a few days. He's the one that has been devouring books on engineering and physics like a maniac."

Dolph turned back to his engine, wishing it was his Death Mobile and not this van they currently had.

Half an hour later, he looked up as Dana walked in. Hot air and blinding sunlight trickled in along with what appeared to be an Amazon. "Hey, Dana. Who's your friend?" the huge teen called out.

Dana was busy stripping out of a heavy leather jacket. "Heya Dolph, Janeka. This is Alecia. She runs the local Amazon 'ranch' out here. I ran into her while dealing with a vampire hit man last night. Those religious wackos from the south side can't seem to get a clue."

"Miss Vatali is a terror on the leeches. The local Black Furies seem to love her," Alecia said as she shook Dolph's cold hand, feeling the iron tough muscles under the skin. She was slightly older woman with dark red hair, peppered with gray.

Janeka raised an eyebrow at that while looking at her cousin. "How's that work?"

"They like my mother a lot. And when I beat up one of their Elders during a practice they seemed to decide I was worth it," the daughter of Artemis said with a shrug. "I'll probably be spending more time at Alecia's place getting to know the local tribe of Amazons."

"S'funny that they use one of the 'ranches' as their front. I would have thought it upset their feminism," the black scion stated.

"It is a front for the most part. It allows us to keep our population up while being mostly out of sight. I think the sheriff has an idea, but he's keeping quiet on it," the Amazon said as she leaned up against a support pillar.

"He's under control of the downtown vampires; the ones led by that businessman. I think he's the leader of their group," Dana noted aloud.

"Yeah, he's a bit out of his depth and not prone to rock the boat. He's probably thrilled that you guys have been killing the Sabbat for him, but too smart to try and talk to you directly. We were gearing up for a bloodbath until you six showed up-"

A massive boom sounded from outside while the ground shook slightly.

"What the hell was that?" the older woman demanded.

"Sounds like a giant landing from a leap, but more metallic," Janeka said as her hyper-sensitive ears picked up details most had missed.

"Well let's go greet our new guest," Dana said as she pulled her shadow-mask over her face from around her neck.

Sheila appeared in a blur as they moved towards the back dock. "What's going on?"

"Don't know yet. Might be an attack," the big Aesir stated as he shed his work overall and pulled out his spear.

The dock door rolled up with a clatter under the electric motor's whine.

"I want one," Janeka decided instantly

What was revealed was a squat, armored form that obviously not a creature but some sort of mecha or robot. Easily twenty feet tall, the black and chrome thing looked like someone had melded a death knight with an organic super-robot from Japan. It had a sword held in front, point jammed in the hard packed dirt and its hands on the pommel. A hollow, muffled voice called out from within the grill of its helmet, "I seek the one that is half-mortal, half-divine; caught between life and death. It has been foretold that I can be released from my state by challenging him."

All the women looked over at Dolph, who looked quite surprised. "Um, only guy here right now. Think I'm the one that you are looking for."

With a clatter and click, the helmet flipped back and part of the torso opened up to reveal a very pale man with dark hair inside. He had been slightly curled up, silvery-gold streamers bound about him. "I am Grim Ebon Doom Waiting. Will you meet me in single combat?" he called out.

"Maybe. Why should I bother?" the Aesir asked. This was the challenge he lived for.

The pale warrior tapped his chest. "We are closer than brothers, but only one of us can truly live. And I intend that to be myself."

"You don't appear to be from around here," Dolph noted aloud with a crooked grin. "What reject fantasy land did you drop out of?"

"I traveled through the seas of Chaos from Creation itself. My dark Exaltation burns to rend your soul from you, god-blooded. Know that your status as god-blood does not impress me," the dark warrior declared. His too-pretty face looked terrifying somehow as he scowled at the godling in front of him. "Pray to your godly parent as an ode to your pathetic life."

Dolph swelled up, easily topping eleven feet. "You have a high opinion of yourself, jerk." Rock flowed up from the ground, covering him in a layer of earthen armor. "This one is mine!"

The new Amazon looked over at Dana. "Is this a normal occurrence?" Her .45 revolver seemed quite unimposing against such a large foe.

"It's been a quiet week or two actually," the daughter of Artemis noted in a suffering tone. "I'm more worried about the flying ship up there with a crew of skeletons." She was pointing up at the ship high up in the air.

"How about we let Dolph deal with his challenge while we take that ship. Air pirate style," Janeka said as she looked at her cousins.

The Shovel slammed against the fifteen foot blade of the magical power armor, sending it staggering back in clomping metal thudding steps. The big Aesir frowned as it felt like he was fighting someone with inhuman levels of skill in his swordsmanship like Dana. He would have to work around that. The ground started to rumble beneath his feet.

"Yeah, he seems to be doing okay. Ready for a lift?" Winds swirled around the youngest scion as it picked her up.

At their nod, the daughter of Athena grabbed an outstretched arm from both of them and rocketed into the sky with a boom as they broke the sound barrier. The son of Hel barely even noticed them leaving as he put his whole body into a leaping two-handed chop with his hands at the very end of his spear, maximizing his strengths leverage and power. The clang was deafening, as it almost knocked the magical power armor to its knee even if it did block the attack with his Daiklave.

"Such power! It must be mine!" the Abyssal shouted, smashing the one ton sword onto Dolph's armored shoulder as the Warstrider charged out of the fifty foot wide impact crater from the last attack.

The Aesir just grimaced while baring his teeth against the pain. "I almost felt that." In fact, his shoulder throbbed in pain, only his ichor had allowed him to weather the attack without crippling injuries.

"You are a monster! Good! Let the darkness within us be one," the Exalted called out as he lashed out with a kick to try and push back the smaller figure.

The three cousins landed on the ship, facing off against dozens of undead. The first exploded as Dana shot her sickle out on its chain. Sheila blew the skull off another with a quick shot while Janeka floated up into the air as bronze and steel swirled around her; becoming the form of a twenty foot tall, female juggernaut wielding a large spear. Her new, armored form looked vaguely Grecian in form.

"Warstrider!" a spectre within a decaying body shouted. "Swarm it!"

The undead charge forward across the petrified wood of the deck, only to find that each of the demigoddesses were more dangerous than they looked at first glance. The very tides of the moon seemed to send them staggering into sickle, sword or spear. Janeka swept three off the side with her spear, then stomped on under a size fifty metal boot.

Back on the ground, Dolph was getting very upset at the (frankly) absurd level of skill the warrior in front of him was showing. Every single trick that he had picked up on with using his spear was neatly negated. So he decided to do something about it in a reckless manner that most people would assume he was insane for using. The butt of the Shovel slammed into the ground to block the next swing even as one hand left the haft of the spear.

Grim Ebon Doom Waiting blinked as his foes grabbed his huge sword by the edge. "Fool. What do you think you are-!"

Dolph did not really care if his Abyssal foe held on to the robot-sized sword or not. Inhuman strength lifted the five tons of Abyssal steel and magical jade into the air, then slammed him over and onto its helmet so hard the packed dirt exploded in a ten foot crater. He left his spear, grabbing the Warstrider's massive, airplane-wing sized blade with both hands. The mecha's kick to his face barely loosened a tooth as he exerted himself fully to smash the robot head first into the ground again.

The Abyssal Exalted let go of his blade as his dark-noon sun sigal bled on his forehead in crimson defiance. Most likely his foe would drop it and he could regain his potent offense and defensive tool momentarily. The magic-mecha groaned as it rolled to its feet and towered over the eleven foot half-god. The god-blooded were never supposed to be this strong. He had ignored the Alchemical Exalted's warning to not underestimate his target. Brazz'tsh would never let him forget it either.

With a chuckle, Dolph threw the sword into the air like some oversized dagger. It would land miles away imbedded in the hood of a derelict truck. The demigod of death and strength then threw himself bodily at the giant foe, a dark gleam in his eyes. The armored form was just a distraction from his real foe. Fingers grabbed at the gap between the helmet and torso, shattering the impossibly tough metal as if it were brittle clay rather than unyielding soul steel.

With a bellow of fear and anger, Grim Ebon Doom Waiting directed his warstrider to crush his foe in a bear-hug even as too-big hand encircled his own neck. "Die, foul slave of the gods!"

Dolph's ribs creaked under enough pressure to shatter rocks, but it was Grim Ebon Doom Waiting's neck that gave out first with the horrid sound of bones snapping like twigs. The warstrider's legs collapsed and they fell over to the side. The Aesir had a triumphant smile upon his face, only to drop as he saw dark hands reaching from beyond space and time to take up the suddenly screaming soul in front of him.

_'__Mine__,'_ a raspy voice of a dead and bound, betrayed and fallen demigod of Creation called out.

"Oh, hell no," the demigod of death stated, grabbing the immaterial soul to start an impromptu tug of war. He planted his feet as best as possible on the uncertain surface of the black warstrider. He had an innate stubbornness and willingness to face nearly any odds that he brought to the fore. All-colored ichor sang within his blood as he attempted to forestall a fallen primordial of an ancient, alien realm.

The Deathlord howled as it felt something resisting its power. In the Realm of the Dead, this should not be possible! Only his masters the Neverborn should be able to stop him.

The son of Hel felt the muscles in his back burn as they were finally pushed to their utmost and beyond. The ground rumbled, then collapsed in a one hundred foot wide crater from the pure physical backlash of the spiritual battle. With a roar, Dolph tore the ghost from the shadowed hands.

_'__There__will__come__a__reckoning__, __godling__,_' the Deathlord promised._ '__When__you__are__not__so__far__from__my__power__, __I__will__reclaim__that__which__is__mine__.'_ And then the shadow disappeared.

The demigod dropped to one knee, breath panting in his ears as a cold burning started to travel up his arms. The reality fracture line in his body was glowing with a malevolent red glare as the ghost was absorbed into his essence. Grim Ebon Doom Waiting's Dusk caste-mark appeared on his brow, bleeding red incandescent power as his soul struggled with the alien soul parcel. The black sunburst seemed etched there upon his forehead in fading, horrific majesty.

"What the hell was that?" Dolph said to himself as he struggled to be himself and not be overwhelmed by the alien memories. Reflexively, his superhuman intelligence blocked most conscious access, leaving only a strong sense of a past life similar to an over-riding deja vu.

Janeka landed with a boom next to him, still in her armored juggernaut form. "Dolph! Are you alright?"

"Yeah, I think I will be," he called back as he struggled to his feet. His form shrunk to its normal height of merely six foot seven. "Now that's an odd thing."

"What?" the demigoddess of war and chaos asked.

"Looking up to you," he replied with a smirk on his lips.

The flying skyship loomed overhead, a techno-magic steam punk dream given reality in Gothic overtones.

Dana waved from the edge. "We have an airship now. Pretty cool, huh?"

Sheila stuck her head over the edge. "So what was this all about?"

Dolph looked down at his pale, strong hands. "I think it deals with that broken mirror. Something bigger happened there than we know. I think..." The Aesir paused for a moment as he tried to figure out the strange puzzle. "I think that Grim Ebon Doom Waiting was somehow me through that mirror. Some place, some when in a strange, distorted matter. I absorbed his soul." But not what gave him his power, he realized.

"You have a mark on your forehead," Janeka said worriedly as the bronze and steel armor sublimated off of her.

"And flashes of memories. Knocked the wind out of me," he admitted.

The Amazon Alecia ran up. "Everyone all right? Well, everyone on our side?" she called out.

"Yeah, think so," the daughter of Ares replied.

"Called the sheriff to let him know its some of the 'really weird stuff' and he's going to swing by in a few hours. So I hope you have some way to clean this up," the older woman said as she gestured across the whole, devastated battlefield.

"Easy enough." Dolph hopped to the ground in the crater then picked up the warstrider (a voice whispered in his ear _'__Shadow __of __Death __Burgeoning__'_) with one hand. The five tons of supernatural metals and the dead body not even a slight strain to the supremely strong demigod of death.

Alecia gulped silently at the very forbidding and brooding teen. "Right."

* * *

><p>Two days later, Sheila was wondering if something was up with Janeka and Dolph. The largest scion seemed distracted as he played with a daiklave that he had found sheathed on the back of the Warstrider. The black metal seemed to say something to him, though she had the strange feeling that she could see distorted ghosts in the reflection of the metal.<p>

Janeka, on the other hand, seemed ecstatic with the magitech robot. She, her golden servant and her robotic attack drones were busy disassembling the monstrosity. It was laid out over a fifty foot square area quite meticulously.

"I don't get this black metal," the daughter of Ares admitted. "It seems to absorb energy easily. Even heat." But what did it do with it?

Dolph walked over with the six foot blade. "It's... soul steel. Literally souls forged into cold iron. If you know what you are doing, you can make it." And somehow, he did. Like he knew the name of this sword if he thought about it hard.

_Nights __of __the __Deadly __and __Overwhelming __Mist__._

"Really? Huh. Guess that makes sense. Not sure I can work with that. The other materials I've found are damned cool too. A silvery metal that seems perfect for joints. This gold stuff transmits control codes through these runes and its even stronger than that soul steel stuff. Then there are these inserts of different colored jades." Janeka moved around her fifty foot square section of floor of the warehouse she had appropriated to set all the parts. In her mind she was already thinking on scientific equivalents, though for some things she would have to use more of these materials.

"You look like you have an idea, Dolph," Sheila said as she watched the Aesir while he looked off into the distance.

"Yeah, I think I do." He strode out the warehouse and into the auto shop where the early morning worker was drinking his cup of coffee. "Good morning, Phil."

"Morning, Dolph. I stopped for some donuts," the manager said, pointing to the box of glazed donuts.

"Thanks." He grabbed one absently and had it finished by the time he had walked the fifty feet to the warning stone.

The ten tons of ugly rock was something that he and Dana had worked out between them. The Giovanni, those necromancer mafia-type vampires, had tried to send a few ghosts to spy on them for some sort of attack. Dolph had caught the ghosts and then with the daughter of Artemis' mystical help, had bound it to a prison within the rock. The ghosts had wailed at the injustice (in its mind, at least) but Dolph now had a more... thorough solution.

"Jared, it's time to meet your maker," the Aesir called out in grim humor.

The ghost, still wearing the pin-striped suit of its life from the 1920s, just glared at him. "Even you can't destroy me, son of Hel."

"Not yet, no." Dolph smiled at him, like a shark to a very small minnow.

A ghost of an old woman with a tongue twice as sharp as her apparent age frowned at that. "Son of Hel, what are you doing?" Her archaic dress and hat was also from the early 1920s.

"I'm getting rid of a loudmouth that seems to think that annoying me is the best way to force me to free him." Dolph snatched out and grabbed the old style mobster to drag him into the workshop.

Jared "The Wrench" Hostler struggled fitfully against the inhumanly strong grip. He had found, much to his chagrin, that his most potent abilities that could kill the living and vampires with little trouble barely raised a blister upon this one. "I'm going to kill you someday. Just you wait, you pale ass Swede."

Dolph bit his tongue, realizing that taunting him about crafting him into a weapon might not be terribly smart. He slammed the ghost onto his anvil, then slapped a hunk of iron ore from where he had been heating it up in a furnace. Then he grabbed a hammer and slammed it down, ichor singing in his blood.

The ghost started screaming almost immediately.

Idly, the demigod ruminated about showing off his first attempt at soul steel to the other ghosts. That would probably get them to shut up.

* * *

><p>The band of demigods had formalized around a weekly meeting where they would go over what projects they were working on or what they were trying to accomplish. Dana usually let the group know that she was researching spells or talking to her various groups of interest such as the werewolves or her Amazons. Tsukyo was integrating himself into the dance and performance troupes while trying to get a bit of his education finished. Soda, snacks and sandwiches made this a working 'supper'.<p>

Sheila took Dolph's black steel dagger, noting that the sheen had just a hint of the soul forged into it. "Interesting. So, you can't really destroy a soul, but you can forge it into a new form. I guess this is a dark form of reincarnation." She hummed a bit at that even as she slid it back to Dolph.

The big pale teen nodded. "Right. Besides, I figure that wretch deserved it if anyone did. The Giovanni are suddenly all sorts of polite to me. Even willing to acquire the souls of the truly damned for an alliance with me."

Janeka nodded across the small, cluttered conference table under the sunshine from the setting sun through the slightly dirty and dusty windows. "I guess they decided to be smart. My problem has not been so simple. I might be able to kludge a half-fix on Dolph's new ride, but I need more of the exotic materials to do it right. And that gold stuff has some really interesting properties. I'm pretty sure I can make an actual fusion reactor if I could get more of it."

"It's magical by itself. I know how to make the soul steel with iron and, well, a soul. But I don't know how you make Orichalcium and the Moonsilver," the Aesir stated, then shrugged.

Dana took a moment to pull her silvery sickle out of its shadow-space. "If it is moonsilver like my relic, from what I can tell, it is almost pure magical moonlight crafted into the purest silver. Supposedly this was crafted on the Moon by my mother, even though she's not big into making things."

"The jade is pretty too," Tsukyo noted. He was happy to hang out at the meetings and he could occasionally help with some of his powers. "I wonder what you add to gold to make it magical?"

"We could try sunlight," Dorathi finally said, intruding on the meeting finally. "The highest mountains that are in sunshine all day." The Atlantean demigod had been a bit morose and depressed since he had taken control of his shared body.

"You aren't thinking big enough, Dorathi. Or not high enough, anyways." The black scion of Ares had the biggest grin on her face. She turned to Sheila. "You thinking what I'm thinking?"

"You want to move up the space-rocket project to forage for this super-gold in space?" the youngest scion asked as she pulled out a folder for one of the projects they had brainstormed with as a group. "I would need to do a lot of work on the chemical propellent and hardening the combustion chamber."

"We're starting to clear enough money from our computer patents and designs to work on bigger projects. And with us doing the labor at our insane rate, we can do years of assembly in weeks." Janeka pulled out some blueprints and rolled them out. "Single-stage-to-orbit. The holy grail of rocketry. If we can hit the thrust-to-ISP ratio we are thinking we can do with the exotic propellants, we can get us and a small cargo module into orbit fairly easily."

Dolph looked slightly surprised at that, then turned to Sheila. "How is that coming?"

"I think I'm pretty close, but I'm trying to make sure it burns cleanly enough to not poison a large area of the planet," the youngest scion explained. "I think I have a jet fuel derivative that I can market too. I've managed to get it about 10 % more dense than kerosene but to have almost as much ISP as a liquid oxygen/hydrogen engine."

"Well, let's see what we can do," Dana said as she nodded, already thinking about trying to make some magical moon-silver like her mother seemed to like.

Even for demigods, they had a lot of work set before them.

* * *

><p>The six foot seven inch tall Aesir opened the glass door, reached into the refrigerated cooler and pulled out two six packs of beer, the clink of their bottles filling his ears. A twitch of effort and suddenly he looked nearly fifty years old with graying hair, crow's feet and wrinkles. He was still incredibly handsome from the gift of his dread mother, but he had that aged movie star look rather than his normal too-handsome Fabio playboy look.<p>

Whistling a jaunty little tune, he walked up to the cash register and paid for his munchies and beer. Dana had better appreciate him doing a beer run, he grumbled internally to himself. "Thanks, Anne," he said absently to the older, stout lady behind the counter, not realizing he nearly sent her swooning.

"You come back any time, sir," the cashier said. She would have to try and get his autograph next time.

It was only a few more moments to put the candy, chips and beer on the passenger side seat and then he was pulling out of the small dirt parking lot of the convenience store.

Dolph squinted in the early spring sunlight of the Arizona desert as he drove his big, black and chrome truck with an easy skill. Their rocket was coming along well and the parts he was picking up from the avionics shop across town would let this only take a few more days. His pale, blue eyes swept across dry desert as he turned off the main highway to the dirt road only about ten miles from the shop.

So the sudden shattering of his windshield and and the loud crack as the back of his seat exploded was quite jarring. "What the hell!" He slammed the brakes and sent the Ford skidding off the road, just avoiding a large rock. He popped open the door even as he looked over his shoulder to see what had happened.

The three inch hole in the seat and back of the cab shot adrenaline even as he ducked down, scanning around for an attacker. His far too lucky ability to occasionally ignore surprise attacks had come in too handy, it appeared. It was too bad that after he was aware of the danger, it did not seem to work anymore. There. "Who the hell are you?" he yelled out to the woman with the large rifle down the road and beside a large cactus.

The pretty woman looked up from her scope, scowling. Her orders were clear, if she were challenged she had to respond. She put the rifle across her back with the shoulder and then in a blur, ran over to within fifty feet. "Dolph Jorgenson, you are hereby sentenced to death. Surrender and I will make it swift and painless. Your crimes will not go unanswered."

"You didn't answer who you were," the much taller Aesir demanded as he reached into his shadow space for Døråbning til Grav. The 'Shovel' as Janeka had nicknamed it seemed to carry a greater weight than normal.

"Son of Hel... bringer of Doom... I am Valentina Wednesday. I am your death," the tall woman said, her long blonde hair pulled back in a tight ponytail. She was garbed sensibly in combat fatigues.

"Yeah, well, that ain't happening," Dolph snapped back as he crouched down. With a 'thoom' he leaped into the air to smash down with his spear, splitting the earth with absurd ease and setting off seismographs in Las Vegas.

He also failed to hit the woman by at least thirty feet as she almost flickered across the dry, packed desert sand. She raised the gun to her shoulder and fired, hitting him almost centerline on his torso. The bullet spanged off into the sands as the copper jacket twirled through the air.

"You are going to have to do better than that," the Son of Hel stated as his features turned horrifically terrifying while keeping most of the major features nearly identical. He leaped towards her again, only to see her back up in a quick skitter. Another bruise appeared on his chest as she fired her rifle, his superhuman stamina easily absorbing the armor-piercing round.

She kept pulling back and his leaping jump-attacks were not coming nearly close enough. So Dolph changed his tactics as he landed near a rocky outcropping. Tough, more than human fingers gripped into the sandstone and with an upward ripple of his back and shoulder muscles, he lifted hundreds of ton. With a battle cry yell, he threw the house-sized rock at his annoying target, only to see her again dodge the attack with absurd ease. "Damn you." He was almost growling.

"No, damn _you_. I will send you to your mother in a black casket for your murderous deeds," the assassin declared even as she sighted down the rifle again as she skidded to a halt on one knee. The rifle cracked again, to seemingly little effect.

The twinge of a fifth bruise on his chest was warning Dolph that even his superhuman stamina was not endless. Crazed, angry eyes that promised death glared at her before the Son of Hel let the earth swallow him whole. He bit back a groan under the ground as he directed his ichor to heal his wounds now that he was not being constantly attacked. He cautiously reached out through the earth, trying to sense Valentina moving upon the ground. His mastery of the element of earth should allow for that.

Two minutes later as he swam through the ground, he realized that she must have moved beyond his range or just was not moving. He cautiously poked his head above ground, looking hard for the demigoddess that had attacked him. Nothing that he could see.

Even so, he mostly swam through the rock and sand like it was less than water. Finally, near his truck, he let the earth push him out so that he was once again standing on the ground. His black-steel spear was kept at the ready as he tracked back and forth.

"Huh. Guess she took off," Dolph said as his good mood lightened his appearance to that of an Adonis.

The load in the back of the truck looked fine, even as the Aesir fingered to fairly large hole in his seat. It was high up, near the edge. Exactly where his heart had been. He shook his head, feeling a chill travel up his back that had nothing to do with the ambient temperature.

He slipped behind the slightly too small wheel, glad for the king cab version, closing his door. "I'll have to re-upholstery the leather-" he was saying to himself as he turned the key to ignite the engine.

Beep-beep-beepbeepbebebebebeeeee-!

Dolph was just starting to move and the door just starting to open again when a thundering explosion ripped through his seat as the M18 anti-personnel claymore mine under his seat triggered.

Two thousand feet away, Valentina stepped out of a shadow even as her form blurred out of the air and shadow. "That was for Brynhild, asshole." Before the first fragments of the truck rained down upon the desert, she was running south to Las Vegas with the satisfaction of vengeance burnt out of her heart, leaving a cold void behind.

It was time to let her father, Odin One-Eye himself, know of her success.


	6. Gold, Murder and Death

**Chapter 17: Gold and Dark Discoveries**

"Did you hear that?" Janeka asked as she looked up from her soldering iron. She was currently working on a multi-cpu chip that was both more powerful and easier to program for than anything Intel could hope to match for decades.

Sheila looked up from her own work as she had been calculating the laser lithography of the chip dye. "I think it was from outside." They both stood up from the office desks above the front shop of the warehouse.

"What's up?" Tsukyo asked as he danced across a complicated set of strings which he was practicing his dance steps ten feet up in the air.

"Thought we heard something outside," the black daughter of Ares said as she carefully held her .50 casul custom hand cannon ready.

The parking lot (really, just some packed dirt, dry and dusty under the Nevada sun) was empty and there was no one visible. Sheila went left, while Janeka went right as they did a quick perimeter sweep. They were just meeting out back to the loading dock when the rumble of a distant explosion drifted from the south.

"What was that?" the Scion of Susano-O asked, as even he had heard the noise.

Both girls had turned their inhuman senses towards the explosion, hearing the sound of fragments of metal raining down. The contrail of smoke that drifted up was just over the hill and where the road led.

"We better check it out," the daughter of Ares ordered.

The three of them took off at a run across the hot, dry land. It took far less than a minute to arrive at the scene of a devastated truck. Black, oily smoke was rising from the vehicle as the three scions looked on in stunned horror.

"DOLPH!" Janeka shouted out, rushing down the hill in a blur. Sand and dirt was kicked up in a huge plume behind her. "Dolph!"

The door kicked open as the big Aesir stumbled out. "What? That bitch blew up my ride!" He was looking around for the attacker, but she was long gone.

Dark brown eyes studied him worriedly, frowning as she saw the holes through his clothing, splatters of blood on his shirt and (strangely) incredibly luminous and healthy looking skin and hair. The insides of his truck seemed to be covered in the shredded remains of skin and hair. "What the heck happened? Are you alright? What's with that shit in your truck?"

Dolph blinked (mirroring Sheila and Tsukyo) as he processed the demands. Janeka was sounding a bit frantic. "Oh. Got attacked by this female Aesir. She was really angry with me and so we got into a fight. Slippery bitch, kept dodging and backing up while still shooting her gun at me. I could take it, but she was wearing me down. Decided I had enough of that, so I ducked into the ground and tried to ambush her but that didn't work so well. I couldn't sense her on the ground. I had thought she had left though, so I got back in the truck to continue home and she blew me up." He suddenly puffed up his chest a bit. "But I've been working at using my supernatural looks and shapeshifting to defend myself. So the explosion only shredded this skin off. Then you showed up."

Sheila and Tsukyo shared a quick look.

The young dancer was nodding his head. "Yeah, you can shed your skin and let it take all the damage. Takes a bit out of you, so you can't do it that often."

"Why the hell didn't you call for help?" Janeka demanded of the much taller scion. She almost had a crick in her neck to look up the twenty inches, so her glare lost a bit of impact.

"Um, sorry. We should probably get some radios or something so we can. I could have really used a good cell phone." Dolph scratched the back of his head as he tried to make heads or tails of Janeka's reaction. She sounded terribly upset. Well, more upset than he ever remembered her acting before.

The youngest scion was sniffing around the truck, trying to pick up a scene or spot a trail. "A girl you said? I think I have her scent. I'm going to track this. Tsukyo, you with me?"

"Got your back, girl," the half-Asian said with a stunning smile and a thumb's up.

They left Dolph and Janeka to clean up, moving quickly across the desert. Unfortunately, they lost the trail just five minutes later in the middle of the city.

* * *

><p>Dana had a little better luck a few hours later but she still lost the trail in Las Vegas. She figured that the assassin must have teleported somehow.<p>

"I figure she used some unknown touchstone or something," the supernatural tracker explained later as everyone was in the 'living room' of the warehouse. She took a sip of her fruit juice pensively. "This Vali sounds like a dangerous person if she can hurt Dolph like he said."

Dorathi nodded. "Is there something I'm not understanding about your relationship to your family?"

The big, pale-blond nodded even as he sighed from his half of the couch. "Yeah. I'm pretty sure they either hate me for my mother or distrust me for my grandfather. Loki..." Dolph paused here. "His children are the black sheep of the Aesir. One of them is foretold to eat several of the gods during the end times, another kills Odin's favorite son Thor and the last is the goddess of Death. And I can personally attest to the fact that she's a total bitch."

The Atlantean blinked at that. "I thought that they were upset because she had refused to release one of their mortals from her grasp?"

"I doubt they would even try, considering what she is like," Janeka said with a smirk. "We still on to catch that flight to Mexico tomorrow? We have some time as we are waiting on the engine blocks to be delivered for our project."

Tsukyo looked up from his magazine on male styles and fashion. "I still don't totally understand what we are doing."

"We need to get some more of this Orichalcum and the only terrestrial place we figured out from myths and such was the City of Gold," Janeka explained carefully. "El Dorado, the fabled city that Cortez tried to discover. He probably failed because it's not a normal place, but a Terra Incognita. A magic land that mortals are unable to find."

"Can't Dana's friends tell us? They knew how to make that Moonsilver stuff," the young dancer protested. He really did not want to track through a jungle for who knows how long.

Said daughter of Artemis shook his head. "They only cared to learn how to make their silver, as it's used in their honor swords."

"We got some good leads and it should not take that long. If we don't make any progress in a week or two, we'll come back," Janeka explained in a temporizing tone as she stretched out on her side of the couch.

"What is the worst that could happen?" the Atlantean asked as he went back to his shift.

"You're just tempting Murphy there, bro," Tsukyo said to the ancient demigod.

"Who is this god Murphy?" Dorathi asked.

"He's not a god, but more a concept. Basically, the embodiment of bad luck," Dolph explained. "One of the worst things that you can say is 'what is the worst thing that can happen?' Because then the worst things do happen."

Sheila interjected with a puzzled, considering look on her her pretty face. "But Johnny Reb was real. Doesn't that mean that Murphy could be, too?"

Dana, Dolph and Janeka all shared a quick look to communicate their incredulity at the idea.

"Man, I hope not. Otherwise he'd be the most powerful god of all," Janeka said as she shook her head.

That got a nervous laugh out of everyone.

* * *

><p>"You know, it was traveling into the wilderness in South America that led us to discover Atlantis," Janeka noted aloud in the passenger seat of the Range Rover as Dolph drove it through the jungle track. It was a few days later in the jungles of southern Mexico. Ferns and hanging branches scraped on the outside of the vehicle as it fit down the tight road.<p>

Dolph snickered at that. "Peru was a bit colder though."

"Turn left, Dolph," Dana called out from the back seat. They were following the old instructions, like the heroes of yore instead of just flying their directly to be able to discover the hidden land. The journey was more important than the location for once.

"Are you sure? That doesn't look like a trail," he asked even as he turned off the 'main' trail.

"Positive. There was a marker stone in the jungle there," the tracker said in full confidence.

Sheila blinked at that, as she had not seen the marker. Voreth was snugly belted in the center of the frayed back seat of the dull brown Range Rover. Dana was on her right while Tsukyo was sleeping on her left, face pressed against the window. Sheila, finally, was crammed in the very back with the luggage, holding on to a notebook and scribbling ideas.

"End of the road. No way is this heap fitting through that," the Aesir called out as the rover thumped to a halt in a pot-hole.

"Watch that. These seats suck and I think I've got a spring jabbing into my ass," the black girl from Harlem complained.

Everyone started to pile out of the rover into the sweltering damp heat. Everyone was wearing their armored outfits, most magical leather armor though Sheila had her low-profile ballistic armor that she imbued with some of her ichor. She had a blue long-sleeve T-shirt and jeans over it, making her look almost normal.

It was dark under the canopy as the scions shouldered backpacks and then started up the animal track. Dolph was almost entirely convinced they were getting lost. Only Tsukyo's ability to just know where they were calmed his nerves slightly.

Dana took the lead, chopping through the underbrush with her Moonsilver sickle, perfectly at home following the path.

After about an hour, they had descended deep enough into the valley that they were having to carefully pick their way through a near morasse of a tropical swamp. Tsukyo and Sheila were walking on leaves, lilies and twigs as if it were solid ground. Dolph and Voreth were just bulling through, but they were finding the footing was a tad unsteady.

"Looks like we have some people watching us. Probably some of the local resistance is watching us," Janeka said. "I picked up some chatter on their walkie-talkies."

"So we can expect to get shot at here," the daughter of Artemis murmured to herself.

So the giant dinosaur monster that appeared out of thin air and bit down on where Dana was leading the way was quite shocking as reality hiccuped for just a second. Blood splattered across the water and fronds, but the daughter of Artemis was actually unscathed. She had used the same trick that Dolph depended on where for a moment, not being aware of danger made it just not exist or unable to affect her.

"Dana!" Sheila shouted as the huge head turned and roared at the rest of them.

"I'm fine. Whoa, that's freaky," the older woman said as she leaped into the trees.

The weird mix of Tyrannosaurus Rex, Stegosaurus and dragon wings roared at the demigods. It spat a burning venom at Voreth, setting her and a section of the jungle afire. The strange, glowing green fire caused Tsukyo, Janeka and Sheila to dash out of the area as it seemed it was quite poisonous.

"What is this thing?" Janeka complained.

"Mokole. Alligator shapeshifter. Usually violent, according to the Garou," Diana called out helpfully as she slashed at its thick, mottled hide. Her sickle seemed to cause little damage.

Dolph's spear managed to pierce it slightly, but the the wound seemed to heal quite rapidly. "Oh, that's just unfair."

The daughter of Artemis landed in between the dragon's wings on its back with superb balance. "And unlike regular shapeshifters, their weakness is gold, not silver." Space and time distorted under the Moon's influence, making it easier for all of them to lay into it. The dragon roared again as it flailed around and tried to set Sheila on fire with is phosphorus poison spit.

"Gold, huh?" the son of Hel said to himself as he backed up into the muck as gunfire rained down on the monster. He pulled out one of their gold coins from when they had visited the Underworld. With a flick, he shot it at the dragon's head.

Its head whipped around like a cannon had shot it and it staggered to the side as Tsukyo shattered a leg even as a row of pock marks appeared on its flank from the two demigoddesses of war as their gun cracked death. Voreth grabbed its tail even as she burned with a corona of flames before it could try and sidestep into some spirit world.

Dana finished it off by leaping on its head and slamming the sickle down through an eye and into its brain. With a bellow, the monster collapsed into the muck. In moments, it had shrunk back down to a very normal alligator in size.

"I'm so-oo tempted to make it into some boots," Tsukyo groused as he pulled himself out of the muck.

Dana just gave it a sad look. "He was probably only trying to protect him and his tribe."

"He didn't give us a choice. He did not even try to talk," Sheila said coldly.

"Okay folks," Janeka called out to forestall any arguments. "Let's keep moving. We are still two valleys out from where we think El Dorado is hidden."

* * *

><p>They made very good time, as it was just before noon when they reached the valley. Down in the bowl of the valley were several lakes with several islands.<p>

"They are too uniform," the girl from Harlem noted aloud. "Give me a second, but I think those are some Aztec ruins there." Ichor burned in her veins as her eyes became more discerning than a full laboratory of electromagnetic and optical sensors. "Bingo. Aztec step-pyramids."

"The main one should be the bigger one in the center, on the north face there," Sheila muttered aloud. "Are we supposed to swim?"

"We'll burn that bridge when we get to it," the near-giant blond said with a grin. He had a few ideas.

The next half an hour was fairly simple, chopping through the jungle to come to the edge of the unnaturally placid lake.

"Look, Ma, nothing up my sleeve," Tsukyo called out as he easily stepped out onto the water. His supernatural connection to water let him walk on water as easily as if it were solid ground.

"We can't all walk on water. And I get a sense of danger from within the water." Dana frowned as she considered matters. "Water is a very important gateway for the Aztek. They use it as part of their entrance into the Underworld. I think we have to traverse this without using any other elements."

Huge hands slapped together as Dolph started to rub them together. "Don't worry. We can all walk on water. Just in a way that I'm sure the Atzlanti probably didn't plan." Ice started to grow from his feet, spreading across the pond. Then he started to walk forward. "I doubt they thought of someone freezing the water." He had a savage grin on his too-pretty face, unnerving Sheila just a little bit.

Janeka, on the other hand, was intrigued.

Tsukyo pouted the whole way across, feeling that Dolph had stolen his thunder just a little bit. The son of Susano-O recovered by the time they traversed the lake.

A dark entrance led them down steep, Aztek stairs and into a room that was much, much larger on the inside than the outside was. Pale, golden rock was engraved with images from Ancient Aztek. In the center of the room lay a raised dias.

"Stop!" the daughter of Artemis called out. "There's something here. Something dangerous." The Sicilian ex-cop started to chant, words of power flowing as she brought out her divining bone dice, a Relic from her uncle Apollo.

Sheila really did not see anything, but was willing to trust her cousin's mystical talent.

"What are you seeing?" the dark-skinned daughter of Ares asked.

"A strand of fate, pulled tight. It entraps people coming here for the secret of 'gold' that lays here in El Dorado." Dana frowned. "That's odd, the strand... It's not Azlanti. It's Aesir."

"Um, say what?" The huge, pale Aesir looked quite confused.

Dana rattled the bones on the ground in front of the entrance even as she continued to study it. "I think I have it." The daughter of Artemis then started to tumble and leap through a strange pattern, always twisting and ducking around something only she could see. Finally she made it close to the stone dais and then grabbed something in the air and started to pull.

"She's found the keystone of the trap. We need to get over there and help her pull it out," the Atlantean mystic explained as she stared at the invisible gap dubiously. She was pretty sure she did not have the ability to cross that distance without getting caught.

"On it," Sheila called out. She then started to duplicate Dana's early hurtling and tumbling with preternatural grace, following the exact same path even as her last cousin worked to memorize the same path. "Grab your hands? Or right above or right below it?"

"Hands," the young woman said. "We need to pull it out of the ground, then it will materialize-"

Sheila's smaller hands gripped on top and then pulled. Ichor thrummed in her body as her strength doubled... than quintupled again.

Blood started to seep out of the daughter of Artemis's hand, but she was sturdy and ignored the pain. The air shifted as a glowing, luminous strand of sun-bright fire appeared in the air, swirling ominously. A soundless, windless roar echoed as Fate was moved and the strand was returned into a more portable form. The shard of ice had a heart of fire that flickered ominously.

"This is... Loki's, somehow. Loki's Fate," Dana breathed as the rest of the band trotted up.

"What?" Janeka demanded. "Why would Loki's Fate be here?"

Dana shrugged even as she healed her cut hands. "I've read that he is fated to die in Ragnarok. He and Odin have been trying to stop that or duck dying at least." The pretty Sicilian woman flipped the shard of ice in her hand.

"I'll take that, if you don't mind. I might need a bargaining chip against granddad." Dolph took the shard, studying it intently.

"Dammit all to #%^ *$!" Janeka had moved over to the dais to study it more closely. "This is only instructions for how to make Orichalcum. Melt gold in a volcano and focus lots of sunlight onto it to imbue it with 'holy radiance'. Shit."

"So back to Plan A, even if it takes a few more months," the youngest demigoddess said.

* * *

><p>Which led all the demigods to work harder on their project. Janeka had a list of possible prospects even as the most advanced rocket in the world was being built. Smart skin that could dimple to flow through the air better than even the least frictional surface, engines that were easily twice as powerful as any chemical propulsion while the whole rocket was made of lightweight materials that were stronger than steel and lighter than aluminum.<p>

The one hundred foot long rocket was carted out to the concrete launch pad they had created on a custom trailer. Dolph cheated outrageously, lifting into place without bending a single strut. He gave them a wink at that.

"Figured out how to not break the gigantically huge things I can lift. Now I can beat on people with a building and put it back unbattered later." It was easy to remember that he was only eighteen with that boyish smile.

"I have got to figure that out. I break things way too easily," Sheila admitted.

The local sheriff arrived about an hour later to check their paperwork, quite surprised to find all of the FAA and NASA paperwork was quite correctly filled out (thanks to a lot of work by Dana and Janeka, both of them had almost silver tongues for handling politics).

Sheila, Tsukyo and Veroth all retreated to the warehouse in the middle of the desert after the fueling had finished with the special fuel that Sheila had carefully created. Janeka, Dolph and Dana had been decided upon due to their crafting specializations and Dana's connection to the Moon through her mother.

Dolph was wedged into the pilot's seat carefully even as he had shrunk slightly to fit into it, Dana to his left and Janeka to his right in the cramped crew module. All of them were wearing fairly lightweight pressure suits. The big Aesir was really only worried about losing air.

"McCarran International Airport, this is flight 5284. We are prepared to lift off and want to verify that we don't have anyone within thirty miles of our location per our flight plan," Dolph called out over the radio.

Janeka was carefully monitoring the rockets sensors for any anomaly. Pressure was rising in the main fuel tank as the sun was warming the rocket, but they had at least thirty minutes before they had to vent anything or for it to start to cause problems. "Supercharger turbine spinning up on electrical umbilical. LASER ignition system is showing all green. Pressure in chamber is rising to optimal levels."

"This is McCarran International. We have your flight plan on file, but it only shows you are going to be in our air space for about ten minutes. We are diverting a flight from Montreal, but it is clear skies otherwise. You are cleared for take off," the controller called back.

"T-minus five minutes and counting, McCarran," Dolph replied as Janeka flipped different toggle switches.

In the warehouse, Sheila and Dorathi were following the progress on the monitors as they did the job of the ground control. Clamps were released, umbilicals readied and backup ignition modules fired.

"T-minus five seconds, primary ignition, T-minus three seconds. Two seconds. One. Launch," Janeka called out excitedly as the very advanced rocket roared to life.

Nevada was treated to the unusual sight of a rocket lifting up into the sky on a pillar of pale blue fire. The trio of main engines in a single row had a variation of a single expanding nozzle built with the highest temperature materials that they could fabricate. As the rocket rose higher and higher, the two flat parallel planes expanded while the curved sides, each looking like half-cones, slid along the edges of the 'flaps' to equalize the pressure flow and to maximize thrust to lift efficiency.

Much to the surprise of the rest of the world, an unlikely band of civilians had managed a fully orbital launch on their very first try.

* * *

><p>Sheila was listening carefully through her earbud (that had no range limitation thanks to magical crafting from Janeka) as the trio of Scions in space bent a few laws of physics to go visit several prospective asteroids closer to the Sun. While most of the rocket was purely science, Dolph and Janeka had made sure that the rocket could not run out of fuel easily. So the rocket could, in just a few days at high acceleration, travel the inner solar system in ways no mundane rocket could even traverse the Earth's orbit.<p>

For her own part, Sheila was starting to tamper with time itself. She and Janeka had disassembled the 'warstrider' built of Soul Steel to discover most its functions. Many were dependent of the mystical materials that they had been trying to obtain, while others just seemed to require a high understanding of crafting.

Janeka well outstripped the youngest Scion here, as she had focused on making it her area of perfection in skill. So Sheila had to work much longer and harder, as she had focused on her athleticism and academics with medicine.

"To think that this future of yours can visit the stars and the sky that was only the gods domain is very strange. And that even mortal may try and succeed," the Atlantean said, interrupting her thoughts.

"Yes. It's an exciting future," she replied.

* * *

><p>They enter the atmosphere at a steep angle, blasting through the air in incandescent fury. The three meteorites hit with punishing force deep in the public wilderness of Nevada, far from any campgrounds and any trails just as the Sun was setting. Local astronomers were surprised, but started to immediately work at triangulating the craters.<p>

Bob Morris was a nature and science enthusiast. When he saw meteorites go by overhead and then heard the explosive impact less than twenty seconds later, he realized that he was quite close. He quickly took down the angle and started to jog over the low hill.

Off in the distance he saw a strange plume of dust across the desert. If the computer engineer did not know better, he would have assumed it was someone racing across the desert. But it was far too rugged and it would have to be absurdly fast.

Sheila skidded to a halt down at the bottom of the crater, the golden meteorite was still red-hot. "Right on schedule. How are you doing, Tsukyo?" She pulled out a chemical fire extinguisher from her belt and started to spray the five foot cubic sized rock.

The son of Susano-O was picking up his own meteorite up, grimacing at the heat that was still giving off the silver. "I'm okay. I'm more worried about Dorathi. He's not nearly as fast as us."

He was nearly as strong, which put them all a tier or two below the monstrous strength of Dolph, of course. But the Atlantean was woefully the least dextrous member of the Band of Artificers. Even Dolph had found he could juggle better than most performers, though he was notorious about not spotting or noticing things.

Each of them bent their superhuman strength picked up the heavy rocks that weighed in excess of twenty tons. Their fleet steps took them out of the fifty foot craters and then sent them racing across the desert under the blood red setting sun.

So it was only Bob Morris that caught a glimpse of a young girl carrying a large boulder upon her back, breaking most land-speed records. The new craters would be closely searched for scientific treasures, but the mystical metals had already been absconded with.

* * *

><p>The rocket came out of the blue sky on a pillar of fire, confounding rocket engineers across the globe. News reporters, cameras and locals interested in space travel were clamoring at the fence line. Sober politicians were lining up to castigate or praise them, depending on their agenda.<p>

It touched down lightly as the rocket engine feathered off. A cheer broke out as the hatch was opened. Janeka shaded her eyes and drank in the adoration. "We appear to have an adoring public," she quipped to her two companions.

Dolph snorted in a way that still made him look adorable rather than silly. "You and Sheila are like some holy abomination of Howard Hughes and Daedalus. So yeah, just a bit."

The daughter of Artemis just rolled her eyes. "And you are a modern Nordic adonis that just happens to tinker on rocket engines." She had to mentally hold herself back from just jumping down to the ground a hundred feet below.

The rest of the week would be dealing with the press and news reporters. They already had licensing deals set up with NASA and the ESA. You could hardly turn on the TV without seeing one of the three new astronauts or a picture of their warehouse.

It was a week later that Sheila got ambushed on her early morning 'jog' of fifteen miles. The young girl blinked as she trotted around the corner to see a CNN reporter set up.

"Good morning," the reporter called out. "You are Sheila Henderson, right?"

"That's right. Can I help you?" the young girl asked carefully.

"Yes, I was wondering if you were really as involved as Janeka White and Dolph Jorgensen in the development of the Heaven Sent Rocket project? You look like a pretty teen model, not a rocket scientist. No offense," the reporter said with a suave smile and cool laugh. That got a chuckle from the camera crew.

"Oh, I just dabble in comparison, really. I only worked on the biochemistry of the fuel, a bit of the superstructure alloying and then smart surface. Janeka and Dolph did a great deal of work on the engines and fuel tank structure." She gave them a sunny smile all at odds with her insulted pride.

"The synthetic fuel you created? I understand that it helps make possible the first Single Stage to Orbit thruster system." The reporter seemed to have done his homework well.

"It's all very interconnected. We came in just 2 % shy of the low mass level to make a SSTO possible, though scaling the rocket slightly larger increases that percentage if you are careful," she replied earnestly.

The reporter seemed a bit miffed that she did not fumble her lines and seemed far too charismatic. Everyone at JWS Inc West seemed far too good to be true, in his mind. "So what are you going to do to top being a rocket legend at eleven years old?"

"Curing AIDS and cancer, renewable energy sources, sustainable fusion power," she started to tick off on her fingers. "And a couple of different solutions for pollution. I'm also helping Dolph and Janeka with a few of their projects."

"Sounds like a busy life," the CNN reporter said with a laugh.

"Life? I figure that the hard parts will be self-sustaining projects that I can hand off in about five years." Sheila was genuinely confused by his comment.

"So you have a prototype fusion reactor back at your laboratory?"

The camera closed up on her face.

"Yes, but it's only about three quarters of the way done at this point." There was not a hint of guile or of any lies at all from the young girl.

"Sounds like we are headed towards a Utopia," the reporter quipped.

"No, more like staving off hell," was Sheila's almost angry rejoinder. "Good day." With that, she took off at a trot, holding herself back from running off at her full sprint like she normally would.

"How do you want to run that, Ray?" the cameraman asked the reporter.

"She was too earnest." Ray Burchman was seriously considering matters. He could easily try to trash her, a relatively unknown person, but JWS Inc. West had already proven they could do the impossible. And he almost believed her that it would stave off hell. "Let's just do the facts."

* * *

><p>Dana's sturdy dark blue ex-police cruiser pulled up to the front of the Warehouse with a screech across the gravel. She was not terribly thrilled with the publicity (and gate guards) at the fenceline. She unlocked the door with a key and passcode to enter into the main area.<p>

Janeka was busy with her latest design, a modern analog to the Warstrider that the alternate dimension Dolph had brought with him. "Yo! Wassup?" the girl from Harlem called out. It was going to be massive, already over fifteen feet tall and she planned to have a pulse cannon and vibro-spear.

Sheila's personal power armor was of a much more modest six feet tall.

"A threatening letter from Chicago just ended up in my mailbox. And, as much as I'd like to just run off, I think I want some backup, just in case." The Sicilian beauty pulled out a plastic bag with the opened envelope to hand over to Janeka.

"Destined to meet- Dire implications of vengeance. And whoa... Mary Muerte?" The black girl rubbed her jaw thoughtfully as she read the letter written on parchment. "Man, this thing is pretentious, vague and uses prophetic triple-speak."

"If it hadn't had Mary's name in it, I would have ignored it. But that bitch took my mother's soul," Dana said in a barely controlled fury.

"You think it's a trap?" the daughter of Ares asked.

"Mary shouldn't even know we exist as demigoddesses, but she might have access to prophetic powers. So I can't say for sure."

"You know, everyone but Dolph and Dorathi is going to want a shot at her." Janeka knew she did, as she was targeting all of their mortal mothers.

That was definitely an understatement, as even Dolph was upset at the murderous Loa demigoddess.

* * *

><p>The letter had led them to a posh penthouse with three women inside. They seemed to be a study in contrasts. One looked to be a professional author or reporter, while another looked like a tough brawler from the bad side of town and the last one looked like she had escaped from a leather and vinyl fetish club.<p>

The 'professional' woman with dark brown hair smiled as she led them in. "My sisters. Magaera and Tisiphone."

"Which makes you Alecto," Sheila blurted out in surprise.

Janeka and Dana both looked a lot worried all of a sudden.

"Children of the Dodekatheon, you are not our enemies," the scandalously clad Tisiphone said languidly as she lounged on the couch in her near nudity. She seemed to derive great pleasure if flustering the two youngest Scions; Tsukyo and Sheila. Little cross pasties, tight leather pants with zippers in interesting places and long leather gloves made her look like a Dom dream come alive.

"In fact, we came to parley a mutually beneficial agreement with one of you," Magaera said, her odd formality quite at odds with her rough and tumble blue-jeans, T-shirt and baseball cap.

Alecto nodded, pushing her glasses back up her aristocratic nose. "Truth. We expect that you, Dana Vitali, are the perfect one. We wish to be allowed out from under Zeus's onerous edicts and to be free to exact justice again on more than just mortals. Much like yourself."

"Shit," Janeka said in a harsh whisper.

"Huh? What's she talking about?" Dolph asked as he glowered at Dana.

The daughter of Artemis just shrugged casually. "I've just been cleaning up Las Vegas a bit. Like anyone cares what happens to pimps, drug dealers and other trash criminals." She gave him a hard smile. "The Mafia even has a hit out on me, but the vampires are too smart to actually take it any more."

"Exactly. She's just like us, but with a more modern outlook," Tisiphone said while smiling at them in a sultry manner. "We want a sponsor that will allow us to do our holy duties correctly, unlike what Zeus has allowed us to do for centuries."

"Only allowing us to work in the mortal world..." Maggaera explained. "We know of your vendetta against Mary Muerte. It is writ in the stars. All you have to do is bind yourself to the Fate of the Furies, young demigoddess."

Snake heads slipped out of the three women's hair, hissing in a strange concordant way.

"All we have to do is place ourselves against Zeus," Janeka noted in a hard tone.

Tsukyo looked a bit worried as he listened, while Dorathi listened closely. The young Amatsukami realized that this was a bit more dangerous than 'just' a fight, while the Atlantean did not like this at all.

"Advocate. Patroness. Perhaps even take responsibility for us. Of course, we have to swear loyalty to you once you become goddess. Our legend is greater now, but you are all shining stars in ascendancy," Alecto explained.

Dana's brown eyes studied them closely. "It's an intriguing offer, but I'm not sure I should accept it. We can hunt down Mary Muerte on our own."

"But we know where she is," Magaera said as she placed a finger on the coffee table which had a map engraved into its wood.

"We know where she will retreat to," Tisiphone said as she gestured to her map.

"And we know if you act now, she will not be able to kill her next victim and dishonor her father more. But I suppose you don't really care about someone now-" Alecto was saying as she gestured at the table.

"Damn. Damn it. She's going to kill another mother of a Scion?" Dana said as she gripped the hilt of her sword.

"Yes. If you do not accept our offer, young huntress, she will kill and come closer to her plot to murder the gods with her treachery and magic."

"Ah, crap," Janeka said softly.

Sheila could only look at her cousin as she realized she did not really know her. "Dana-"

"No, this is my choice. And I accept it. I won't let that murderous bitch get away with murdering the soul of another mother," the daughter of Artemis said. "What she is doing is an affront to their souls."

"Repeat after us, Daughter of Artemis," the three sisters said. "Swear to be our sister in Vengeance-"

"I swear to be your sister of Vengeance-" Dana said through grit teeth.

"To hound the unjust through all the lands-" The hiss of the snakes from the sister's hair seemed to weave a spell on them as the sky darkened in symphony to their words.

"To hound the unjust through all the lands-" The daughter of Artemis felt something burning in her veins as Ichor flowed.

"And to be our only leash upon your apotheosis, letting none else temper our fury as our patroness," they hissed out.

"And to be your only leash upon my apotheosis, letting no one temper our fury as the patroness of the Furies," she finished in agreement as she spoke the words unto power.

For one moment, daylight flickered and then the sun came back.

"So it will be," the four women said in conclusion.

"Where is she?" Dana demanded even as she felt two snakeheads extrude from her hair, hissing in her ears.

"Florida. The mother she seeks was buried in an unmarked grave near Miami, sister," Alecto explained. "She is a demigoddess, just like you, so Zeus has forbidden us direct vengeance-"

"But he has not forbidden you-" Tisiphone said in an angry tone.

"But you had better hurry, as she's going to flee to her home in Cuba. She keeps her treasure of murdered mother's souls there," Magaera explained. Her smile would probably be more at home on a monstrous shark than a person.

Sheila knew a bit of vengeance, as it seemed to be ingrained into the gods of Mount Olympus. She knew, if she felt wronged, that she would exact a revenge that was by most modern people's moralities extreme and out of proportion.

But the Furies seemed to exceed what she knew of that, taking it into a new supernatural level. Something that even most gods would think of as 'too far' and 'too much'.

Janeka's face was set in a flat expression hiding her understanding. Among the gods, the Dodekatheon and the Loa were known to exact terrible vengeance upon those they felt wronged them. The Furies were as far beyond them as they were from the other gods.

* * *

><p>That was two days ago and Mary Muerte was still ahead of them. Her boat had landed upon the shores of the main island of Cuba in the darkest of the night. But Dana had explained to them that she did not seem to realize that anyone was hunting her, as her last soul she had gathered had been a mother and her unborn half-god child that had died in birth with her.<p>

Sheila and Tsukyo had wrapped them in a fog while Janeka had jammed Radar and Sonar while their rented speedboat skidded into the sand on the north shore. The smell of the ocean mingled with the scent of burning sugarcane.

"Hide the boat in the treeline," Janeka called out.

"Got it." Dolph picked up the thirty foot boat as if it weighed far less than eight tons.

The daughter of Artemis was sniffing cautiously in the wind. "She stepped through the shadows here." She started to look around, trying to pinpoint where she would have traveled.

Janeka and Sheila both moved up. The darker-skinned girl pointed towards a small outcropping. "That's the only place that sticks out that would have been in shadows there."

Sheila nodded even as she sent out her sense of smell. "She was there for a little bit, not moving. Which I don't understand why."

"Was it long enough to see us land here in the dark?" Tsukyo asked curiously.

"No, she left a while back," Sheila replied.

"Well, let's be all sneaky like. Yes, even you Dolph," Dana said to the huge, white and none-too-subtle Aesir.

"I can do quiet. I'm just big," he protested a bit. He could not believe they were expecting him to spot something they would not though.

Oh, except that ghost trying to sneak off. They would not be able to see that.

"Excuse me," the big Aesir said even as he crouched down and then leaped. His hands, which could rend steel apart, grabbed the throat of the ghost. "You aren't going anywhere."

"Shit, she almost got warned. Which means she almost got away," Dana muttered. "Can't let that happen. At all." The black clad woman drifted over. "Do we need to bind it here?"

Dolph shrugged. "Seems a waste of time." With that, he snapped the ghost's neck, then laid his other hand on her left shoulder and crushed it to ectoplasmic powder. His kick broke both legs. "She won't be warning anyone for a while. Let's go."

The rest of the group nodded, while Sheila looked a bit pale. She had pulled out the Hadecleus and bent it to help her see the dead, just like Dolph could do. The world become a slightly darker place. And with that now, she led Dolph in hunting the ghosts that Mary Muerte had patrolling around the plantation.

Two hours later, they were looking down on a small home on the edge of a salt-water swamp that probably connected to the Caribbean.

"Tsukyo? Sheila? I need you to lower a fog everywhere but directly around the building so that Mary doesn't have any place to escape to using her shadow steps," the daughter of Ares called out softly.

Both of the children of the Sky lowered a wispy cloud down from the high reaches of the air as an impromptu fog. The world turned even more strangely alien and supernal, cloaked in dark white.

Dolph started the fight, ripping the roof off the house with one might sweep of his fourteen foot long spear, the super-sized Aesir standing nearly twelve foot tall.

The Loa was shocked even as she struggled to stand back up within her mystic circle. "Protect me! Avenge me!" she screamed out to the ghosts and undead under her domain.

Dana landed right next to her, her sickle sweeping a curve of silvery death across her shoulder and throat. "Just die already."

Crack-crack-boom-boom, went both pistols. Janeka's had waited until Sheila's lighter pistol had fired, then unloaded her most serious attack. They had both been aiming for over a minute right through the walls of the small house.

Tsukyo and Dorathi smashed through the walls even as ghosts rose from the swampy ground. Dorathi was alight with red fire while the son of Susano-O slammed a massive heel-drop kick on the top of Muerte's head. That smashed her through the flimsy boards of the floor and blasted them away in a circle. The necromancer was mired in the soft earth as the Shovel came down in a granite-splitting arc that slammed into her off-balanced shoulder.

Mud and grime covered the woman even as Dorathi tried to grapple with Muerte, burning her skin and clothing. Dark brown eyes and her braids spun around as she tried to see some sort of escape as her bloody wounds sizzled in the fire. Then her eyes filled with sunlight.

"Sorry, darling, no shadows tonight," Tsukyo quipped even as he glowed with the radiance of the noontime Sun. He planted both feet firmly on the ground as bullets struck and then put all his effort into his double uppercut under her diaphragm. Her breath wooshed out of her lungs.

"You will never desecrate my mother's grave," Dana promised the daughter of Baron Samedi as she whispered in her ear. And then, with that, she slid the curved edge of her blade along her throat.

Mary Muerte tried to scrabble fitfully, tried to fight for breath, but the world turned dark on her.

Dana nodded her head as she saw the last light of life flee the evil demigoddess's eyes. "Her, we bind to something. And then make a dagger out of her soul."

"Yeah, I ain't going to disagree with that," Dolph said as he shrunk to his normal six foot eight size.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 18: The Vengeance of a God<strong>

A fifteen foot tall mecha stomped its left foot forward. "Ha!" Janeka called out. "Now I am much bigger and stronger than you!"

The Aesir slid out from under his new (and newly armored) van. "Well, I'll grant you bigger," he said with a wry grin. He sat up from the slide-board. "I'll believe stronger when I see it."

The rather lanky young woman inside the fusion powered mecha was more than grinning. "Ha!"

Dolph was expecting it, so met the oversized hands of the mecha for a test of strength. "Seeing is believing, huh?"

"You betcha," the daughter of Ares said while she pushed the controls. "I got leverage and mechanical power-"

"-so why aren't I buckling? Sorry to tell you, but its not quite up to my strength," the Aesir explained as he fully exerted himself.

Her holographic displays inside the 'womb' cockpit inside started to turn red. "Oh, shit."

Nanofiber muscles in the left bicep shredded under the impossible load, snapping at over six hundred tons of force. The concrete under the oversized metal boots shattered as the fifteen foot tall mecha ripped through the ground like it was porous sand and then went skidding to slam against a steel beam of the warehouse's roof support.

"Uh, sorry?" Dolph called out. "I didn't hurt you, did I?"

"Nothing but my pride and the suit." The steel and black mecha scrambled back to its feet as Sheila and Voreth both opened the doors from the living area of the building. Its left arm hung down uselessly.

The hatch hissed open and the lanky black girl scrambled out of the armored battlesuit. "Man, that's going to take a few days to fix."

"What happened?" Sheila asked as she appeared in a blur of motion.

"Just roughhousing a bit. Broke my 'suit." Janeka sounded frustrated, but more in the fact that it would be a good challenge.

"Don't worry, I'll help you with it." Dolph moved up next to the mecha. "Huh. I think it sheared because I twisted a little bit. It shouldn't have done that."

"Technology," Voreth said with a bit of venom in her voice. "I do not understand my brother and yours fascination with such toys."

"Tools are something that everyone can use. From the simple stick used as a lever for force all the way up to computers, they amplify what we have. Sometimes the only difference between two people is their tools, which can make all the difference," Sheila explained carefully. The female persona of the Atlantean could be prickly. "I mean, look at Relics. They amplify our powers and they are purely mystical."

The cream-colored woman frowned, but nodded. "I understand. This modern age is very strange to me and unlike Dorathi, the mystical does not seem to be followed by most people."

The younger girl was walking with the taller, buxom woman. "There are mystics and the supernatural. I mean, Dolph and Dana deal with those vampires all the time. A lot of people go to church. And-"

All the lights seemed to dim and turn green even as all sounds seemed to become muffled and distant.

"Oh, that can't be a good sign," Sheila said as she looked around. She tapped her earpiece, one of Janeka's quantum-entangled communicators. "We've got some sort of supernatural event going on."

"I'll be there in a few moments," Dana called back. In swish of shadows, she was a thousand feet down the road from the window she had been looking out under the morning glare.

"I'm up! I'm up," Tsukyo called out. "Man, can't a guy get some beauty rest?"

One minute later, everyone was assembled back in the main room of the warehouse.

"My amazons are on their way," the daughter of Artemis said even as she pulled down her Shadow Mask, covering her face in total darkness.

The Shovel cut into ground, digging up concrete and dirt. "Figure I better have my Einherjar," Dolph explained as his undead followers dug themselves out of the ground, summoned by his dread spear.

"Son?" Sigurd asked even as the rest of the Norse warriors readied their AK-47s and different blades.

"We figure we're either gonna get a big visitation or an all out attack," Janeka said cheerfully as she pulled out her .50 casul.

Ghostly green fog started drifting in through the north, right through the wall.

"It goes without saying, that's not normal weather," Tsukyo said with a nervous grin.

"Sounds like the direction we need to be heading," the daughter of Artemis said. She moved to the large roll-up doors and hit the switch to run the motors that lifted it up.

"Can't see through the fog," Janeka said. She made a flicking gesture with her sword and it extended a three foot blade. "Did I tell you guys that my dad upgraded my boomstick to stabby-boomstick?"

Voreth stared at the young woman. "He did not actually say it that way, did he?"

"No. Sheesh, lighten up, Voreth," the daughter of Ares shot back in a grumpy tone.

Sheila had pulled Hadecleus from its shadow space, as it appeared however was attacking was planning on forcing the confrontation into melee.

"Even I can't see too far," Tsukyo complained. "And I can see right through a typhoon." His fists crackled with electricity.

It was the stench that hit them first. The fetid, decay of moldering bodies as desiccated human figures walked out of the fog at a brisk, fast pace.

"Zombies? I thought we turned Mary Muerte into an ingot of Soul Steel?" Dana almost snarled out as she cut down the first zombie.

"Yes, you murdered her soul," another zombie said even as it swung its hands at Janeka like rough claws.

The gunshot to its forehead was deafening, taking it out.

"What the hell!?" the daughter of Artemis asked.

"You took her from me. It was my duty to judge her after her life of pain and misery," a larger zombie as Dolph's spear struck home. It vomited a spray of worms and acid that hissed off his leather armor.

Dana swished past it, cutting it down. "Who are you? We had the right to defend ourselves," the newest Fury called out.

"The last day. Lord of the End Day. Baron Samedi. God of the Dead. And you stole my dead daughter. That can't be allowed. And it won't be," another female zombie said. She raised a clawed hand towards Dolph, inflicting horrendous bruising all across his body and staggering him back down to one knee.

"We're fighting a god?" Voreth asked as she burned three zombies that tried to grapple with her. She reached out and snatched another undead off the ground by its head, crushing it.

"So you are declaring vendetta?" Sheila asked as she chopped down two more zombies with her black blade.

"No. Eye for eye and a life for a life. You just have to pay the piper's toll," Baron Samedi said from another zombie.

"Damn, this sucks. He's not really here so we can't even hurt him and he's going to wear us down and then take someone down," Dolph said as his spear spun in an arc over his head and then sent two more zombies flying.

"You are getting close to gods, aren't you?" the Lord of the Last Day said from another undead as he walked out of the green mist.

Each of the young demigods were struck with the perversion of healing working from the strongest to the weakest. Sheila was busy healing each of them after they were hit. Janeka had even been knocked unconscious, but Dolph and Dana furiously fought off clawing hands that tried to finish her off as she was healed back awake. The chatter of semiautomatic weapons rang from his five undead follows, followed by the bellow of his viking berserker that leaped to swing his axe wildly. But the Einherjar were starting to fall, one by one.

The youngest demigoddess was managing to keep up on them when she saw a zombie flicker forward at Janeka's back as some sort of illusion dispelled, revealing an Atlantean Attan with a panther headdress. The Atlantean assassin's curved sword crackled with electricity as it cut through the daughter of Ares's light bulletproof armor. She looked dumbly at the sword sticking out the left side of her chest as the last thing she saw in this life.

"One down," it stated in ancient Atlantean, even as its form seemed to melt away in shadows.

All of the zombies stopped attacking even as Baron Samedi's laughter filled the air. "Ironic! Oh, so ironic. Eye for an eye and a life for a life, I consider this paid in full."

Dolph's voice was a roar of fury in the wind even as the mist started to fade to the mid morning light as Janeka's body thumped to the ground face first.

All of the zombies started collapsing also, like puppets with their strings cut. Golden beams of sunlight started to burn through the mist, revealing a charnel filled battlefield outside the warehouse. The reporters at the gatehouse had been straining to see through the strange mists and were shocked to see the horrors that were suddenly revealed. Cameras were turned to them.

Dana had moved to the last spot the assassin had been, snarling in rage as the trail just vanished into thin air. How?

"No, don't leave," Dolph said as he reached out and held the arm of Janeka's invisible, intangible ghost. One hand still gripped his spear with white knuckles. This was his fault.

"But she's dead..." Tsukyo said in shock.

Her ghost said something, but only Dolph heard her protesting his hold. That she wanted to go to the light.

Dana turned to stare at the spot where Baron Samedi had been last as the twin snakes at the nape of her neck hissed in fury and anger.

The youngest demigoddess had knelt next to the body. "A mortal stroke, fueled by hate. This attack might have killed any of us." The electricity had actually cauterized her heart. She was likely dead before she hit the ground.

That was when Dana and Sheila realized that frost was growing across all the weeds and sagebrush, cracking the earth below Dolph as the ground shivered. Lurid blue runes glowed on Døråbning til Grav, as it lived up to its name, Doorway to the Grave. "Open! Open, damn you!" He had rarely used this power, as it was dangerous to let a portal open between here and the world of the dead.

Ichor roared in the young Aesir's veins, burning with infinite cold as his power pulled up a fifty foot gate of granite covered in Norse runes. The huge, stone doors creaked open, releasing a blast of cold air and fog out of the gateway to the Underworld.

Escaping ghosts shimmered into the sight of mortals, causing a murmur to erupt as the reporters talked in front of the cameras. The Aesir's straw-blonde hair whipped in the wind as his appearance had slipped to match his horrible temper.

Dolph did not care that he was terrifying mortals as Dana carefully picked up her cousin's body. He did not care that ghosts were fleeing into the mortal world. He only cared for one thing now.

"What are you- we doing, Dolph?" Sheila asked as she picked up Janeka's gunblade, Blaze of Battle.

"I'm going to talk to my mother. We are going to have words." And with that, Dolpha picked up Janeka's ghost and stepped into the Underworld.

Voreth watched them step in, then took up her courage and followed. Her hands were clenched in fear, but she was stronger than this.

* * *

><p>The first thing they noticed was the stench as they stepped into muck that flowed blackly around Dolph's waist. Even though it smelled of decay, it was freezing cold though he was immune to such frost and ice. Huge roots rose over their heads.<p>

Dana studied the area through the darkness, seeing the myriad of paths through this Underworld. "The roots of the World Tree." She walked easily on top of the muck, as it was almost more mud (and blood and guts) than just water.

At her side, Sheila was stepping as lightly as possible across the surface of the muck. "I wish I could not ever smell this place again."

Tsukyo floated into the air three inches above the fetid waters. "I don't even have a super-sniffer and I want to chop off my nose."

"It's much, much worse down here," the female half of the Atlantean demigoddess said.

The ghostly Janeka snickered. "I'm dead and I think the smell is awful. You don't have to hold me anymore. I'm not going to float to Greek heaven anymore. It's way too boring and doesn't have any video games."

The son of Hel frowned, but nodded as he let the spirit loose. Janeka looked just as physical as the rest here in this dark and evil place, though she glowed slightly with a silvery white light. "If you feel drawn some place, let us know."

"Righto! Man, I can't believe I died. Wham, bam, thank you ma'am." Her tone may have been light and humorous, but it was also very strained.

"Nidhogg is coming," Dana said, looking through the tangle of roots that were larger than redwood trees.

"Ah, shit," Janeka complained. "It's always something."

"Living souls sneaking into Helheim?" rumbled out the deep, hissy voice of the dragon as it spoke in a strange, alien form of ancient Nordic. It stopped to bite into the huge root in front of it, scraping teeth the size of short swords into the hard and woody root. "Why shouldn't I eat you to fill my unending hunger? Fulfill my hated destiny to eat those that seek passage?"

"We'll fight back," Dolph noted in a horribly raspy voice. He looked more terrifying than the dragon in front of him. Its destiny? It was fate bound to attack them?

"And if you fight us, you might miss that messenger scampering down the tree to you," Dana bluffed as she remembered a small tidbit of information about Ratatoskr bringing messages from the eagle from the top of the tree.

Nidhogg's huge, draconic head snapped up to stare upwards for any sign of the messenger squirrel. Yellow, slitted eyes looked left, right, up and further up with desperate eagerness. It appeared he had a stronger bind to that Fate than attacking them.

Sheila pointed towards the distant shore. The rest of them nodded and they carefully moved off. Janeka started laughing once they reached a far enough distance.

"Man, that was too funny. We should try to avoid fights a bit more in the future," the black young woman said with a final snicker.

"I'm pretty sure he's not going to fall for that again," the youngest scion said. "Where to, Dolph?"

The monstrous looking Aesir was trying to feel as hard as he could in the right direction. "That way, I think. Gjöll is the really loud river that goes down a gorge that no one wants to cross."

The sky was either dark or was a caverns ceiling far out of sight and there were many ghosts wandering around. More than should have been wandering as far as they knew. Perhaps a foretelling of the upcoming war with the Titans when the broke free from their prison.

"Do we have to worry about your mother or monsters between us and her lands?" Voreth the Atlantean demigoddess of mystery asked. She was glad she was sturdy and able to resist almost any clime, as this was still very cold.

"Ooh, that could be cool. Fighting our way there and then freeing your mother. She can't help but be proud enough of you to help bring Janeka back," the half-Japanese son of Susano-O said as he almost bounced along the dirty path in the muddy, weed covered ground.

"Tsukyo, his mother is Hel. She's more likely to kill us than ever bring Janeka back," Sheila said in an angry tone. It was obvious the young girl thought this was not a smart idea.

Voreth stared at the daughter of Athena in horror. "Is what she speaks of the truth? Is your mother so evil?"

Dolph just laughed loud enough it echoed darkly into the abyss around them. "My mother gave me the shade of my just dead father as my chief advisor because he displeased her, then four more traitors and cowards. She is rumored to have never given up a soul in her keeping."

The Teutonic knight almost growled and slammed down the visor on his helmet. The Nazi Einherjar just shrugged even as he settled his AK-47 on his shoulder with its strap.

"And you think you can convince her otherwise?" Voreth asked in shock.

"I figure that we can talk, she can tell me no and then I'll start breaking her hall until she agrees," Dolph replied with a truly nasty and terrifying grin.

"You know, she's likely to just kill you," the grim daughter of Artemis said. "And there are four giants up ahead."

"I don't think I've fulfilled my purpose. So she might not kill me immediately." Dolph's form rippled and grew nearly fifty percent larger. He immediately moved towards where Dana had indicated the giants were located.

"I think he wants to go vent some anger," the youngest scion said. "That's not a bad idea." She rocketed forward across the ground as she grit her teeth and pulled on her powers of war harder. The black sword of Hadecleus was rock solid in her grasp as it glowed a baleful crimson even as Athena's Wit appeared in her other hand.

The hill giant had a bare moment of warning before the sword cut through his neck as the young girl leaped past him.

The other three giants stared in shock at the young, slight five foot five inch girl that had just killed one of theirs in one blow. "You shouldn't be worried about me," she said.

Dolph landed with a deep thud as his one thousand pounds of pure muscle and mayhem landed in their midst. The Shovel whirled through the air and knocked one of the giants away in a spray of blood.

The two remaining giants took a step back. "Hey, we are doing like you said and staying away from Eljuonir."

"So my mother has a treaty with Titanspawn. How come that doesn't surprise me?" Dolph showed his snaggle teeth in a terrifying smile. "But you know what? I don't care right now."

"Hel child? No one said there was a Hel son!" the larger of the two remaining Titanspawn yelled out.

Those were the last words he was allowed to say.

* * *

><p>Sheila snapped another light stick and then hung it on her neck. She, Tsukyo and Voreth had been alternating between providing light. Sheila with lightsticks, Tsukyo with the glow of the Sun and Voreth with candles of fire from her fingertip.<p>

"We should be pretty close here, as this is our ninth day through the valleys of Helheim," Sheila said, wishing that it would warm up a bit. But that was highly unlikely for weeks more. The unending blackness and huge, steep cliff walls of the valleys they traveled had made everyone feel they were deep underground.

Only Dolph had felt totally comfortable.

"I think I hear the gorge," the daughter of Artemis said suddenly.

"Good, that means we are getting closer," Dolph replied.

Two hours later as they saw the bridge up ahead.

Gjallarbru, the bridge over the Gjoller river and gorge, hove into view.

"A little light please, Tsukyo," Dolph asked as he watched the impassive figure in front of him.

A touch of sunlight in this blighted world brought to view the giantess Modgud who barred their way under the glittering, arched roof of the bridge. The twenty foot tall giantess stood ready in her scale armor, her axe over one shoulder and a thick blunderbuss over her other. Her blonde hair was in warrior braids and a helmet with horns sat upon her head.

"Who dares tread the path to Helheim?" she called out in ancient Norse, the language of the Aesir and Vanir.

"Dolph Jorgenson, the Son of Hel, seeks to talk with Hel," Dolph called out.

The statuesque blonde frowned. "The Son of Hel that should not exist. Begone from here, unknown and unwanted. All you will bring here is tears and despair." The axe lifted off her shoulder with a whoosh of displaced air.

"That's not ominous at all," Janeka muttered as she glanced over to her mortal body being held by Tsukyo right then.

"I have stated my name and purpose, why do you bar my path?" the tall Aesir demanded of the much taller woman.

"Only the dead and gods are permitted into Helheim, half-child. I smell the stink of mortality still upon you all except the ghost and the Einherjar. I am under no oath to let you pass and bring ruin here." Modgud looked very unhappy.

"Then you leave me no choice." Dolph's blue eyes were as hard as ice as he pulled his spear out of its shadow space.

"She leaves us no choice, Dolph. Janeka is my cousin and no giant is going to stop us from bringing her back," Sheila stated as she pulled out her own gun. Lightning crackled along the pistol, heralding her power.

Modgud's axe spun up in a whirling arc to block Dolph's spear and Dana's sickle on a silver chain. She hissed in anger as two bullets punctured through her armor. Her blunderbuss whirled around and fired at the fast moving blonde demigoddess as she slid across the ground. The burst of hellish fire filled a thirty foot area, but still missed the nimble girl.

Dana dashed into close melee, spinning in a circle as the vagaries of the pulling Moon twisted the giant's footing. And that was a perfect setup for Dolph's Shovel that smashed into her armor with the power of an exploding shell. That sent her tumbling to one knee, but she was up in a flash, swinging her axe in arc that clipped Dana's arm.

Fire bolts rained down in an arc, just barely under the gold plated roof. They splashed over Modgud and her armor, causing her to grimace in pain. The ten foot tall Dolph then charged directly into melee with her, spear meeting her double-headed axe in a resounding clang louder than jet engines during take off and shook the whole stone bridge with their fury.

Dana was a black blur wielding her Claw of Artemis, the silver sickle slashing out on its twenty foot chain. Modgud snarled at the daughter of Artemis and crouched down to put her whole body and hips into golf swing, spraying the walls of the bridge with scarlet blood and rocketing Dana fifty feet away.

The winds howled through the intervening space as Tsukyo attempted to help while guarding Janeka's body, but that merely caused Voreth's bolts of fire to scatter and set portions of the granit bridge on fire. Sheila's Hadecleus stabbed through the giantess's leg even as Dolph hammered at Modgud directly and straight on.

The oversized female viking warrior found herself being pushed back, further and further. "You shall not pass while I yet have breath," she shouted out as she clubbed down on Dolph's head with her blunderbuss.

"We're working on that," Dana quipped darkly as her sickle was flung out and cut Modgud's cheek.

Dolph spun to his left, letting the huge axe slam into the ground next to him even as he spun his spear so fast it made a whistling sound just before it stabbed home in the twenty-foot tall woman's side and picked up the five ton giantess and moved her twenty feet.

With a cough that hacked up blood, Modgud finally collapsed in a pile.

"Bandage her, please. I'd rather not have my mother wanting to kill us for the murder of the one person she might care for," Dolph said through his ragged, deep breaths. While that might have been a short fight, it had been brutal.

A simple application of Sheila's healing power stayed some of her bleeding wounds to mere bruises. "Done. And since you don't want to anger her yourself..." the youngest said said, trailing off as she walked up to the huge, stone gates of Helheim. In the days since Janeka's death, she had been pushing her power. A glow surrounded her sword, different from her power to strike fatal, mortal blows. With a sweep of her sword, a wall-shattering blast struck the gate and knocked it off one hinge.

"Not bad," the son of Hel said with a smirk.

"Whooee. She must be eating her Wheaties." Tsukyo winked over at Sheila to remove any sting from his teasing words.

Dolph then pushed on the stone gate, finishing knocking it off of it brass hinge. "Mooooother, I'm home."

A ghost was there in a full majordomo outfit. "This way, Master Dolph."

Sheila and Dana shared a quick, worried glance. Hel knew him and his name?

The Band of Artificers walked through the cold and cruel looking hallway and through an ornate double door. Tables lined either side of the hall, filled with empty cups and plates. The obsidian and bone throne on the dias at the head of the tables sat Hel, Norse goddess of Death. Half her face was pretty beyond belief, while the burned skull of the other half seemed utterly wrong and horrifying. Her uniform, a Nazi SS officer's of World War II vintage, was half perfectly preserved and pressed and was half burned and scorched.

"Welcome to my hall, my son." The half of her face that could show emotions seemed to smirk at him darkly. "I see that I am meeting you in good health, though the same could not be said for you and your companions." Her blue eye looked over at the ghost of Janeka and the Einherjar.

"You and father can have a little chat later," the terrifying younger Aesir said. "I'm here for Janeka."

"Dolph? Are you sure about this?" the dead daughter of Ares asked.

"Yes, are you sure? She's just one of those Dodekatheon. They are a dime a dozen. I mean, look at this. You have two spares already," Hel replied nastily, her skeletal right forefinger pointing at Sheila and Dana. "And the cost may be more than you can possibly hope to bear."

Voreth seemed shocked by how this conversation was going. "Is she always like this?" the Atlantean demigoddess asked.

Sigurd and the Einherjar just started laughing. "She's in a fine mood, son. Not even a single death threat or promising to torture anyone for eternity." Dolph's undead father pulled out his whisky flask. "Which means your totally screwed and you don't even know it."

Sheila saw Hel look at him at the comment, memorizing his features. Unfortunately, the youngest Scion agreed with Sigurd, they were probably falling into Hel's trap.

"Father, shut up. I know what I'm doing." Dolph glared at his oft hated mother. "I want you to bring her back to life. I know you have the power to do it."

"Weaken myself for months for some girl? I doubt you would pay my price to bring her-" Hel was saying when she was interrupted.

"I will. Name your price and I will pay it," Dolph said in a hard tone, his hands gripping his spear tightly.

"So easily?" Hel tilted her head as she studied Janeka. "Interesting." She pulled out a scroll and tossed it to Dolph. "Gather these items, craft a dagger from the ephemera and then free Fenris." She smiled nastily at that last pronouncement. "After all, Odin has attacked me and mine and I am no longer oath-bound to not free my brother."

"You are really mother of the year material," Sheila muttered.

That just caused the death goddess to laugh loud enough to fill her dread hall, echoing back and forth horribly. "This... will not be the greatest betrayal for love you will ever see," Hel said in promise, her voice echoing with impossible depth and using words the resonated with Fate.

"Dolph, she's talking about ending the world," the daughter of Ares said. If the black ghost could look more pale, she would have been as white as linen.

"And prophecy, oaths and other dark things," Hel said. She stood up and walked over to the ghost. "And he has spoken and agreed. You at least have some spirit. Almost worthy even." Her tone showed a bit of amusement towards Janeka. "Heroic."

"What is, has been. What was, will be. You should know this, Janeka. All I can do is make things right in the now." His voice was strained as he pronounced his thoughts and his will.

Dolph watched his natural mother as she drew the dark places to her in smokey tendrils, cloaking herself in shadows and the coldest places in the deep, frozen earth. Her flesh seemed to melt into those shadows, leaving skeletal hands that pulled a hood over the top of her head. The Reaper manifested, pressing down upon them with the infinite power of Death and the Afterlife.

The power shook the six demigods' souls, sending them reeling and almost to their knees. Hel glided closer to the fluttering form of Janeka's ghost, taking the black girl by her neck unkindly. With a hiss, Hel spoke words of power that shook destiny itself. "I banish you back from Death to living misery and living recrimination! I abjure you from the ultimate peace and true justice. I banish you to life and regrets. Begone from my domain!"

With a soundless shriek, her spirit was pulled back to her body, which jerked under the cloth that wrapped it and then took a wheezing breath of life.

The Reaper glared at the girl as the shadows that made it up lessened and then fled, leaving the half-horror and half-pretty visage of the Norse goddess of death. The clop-clop of her leather Waffen SS polished black boots was deafening loud on the mirror shined black granite floors.

Hel sat back down on her throne. "It is done, though you might wish to heal her heart before she expires again." She crossed her legs and leaned forward. "You also have my permission to leave. Do not return without the dagger, Dolph Helson."

Sheila was already at Janeka side, regenerating the horrible wound. The very air here seemed to resist for just a second, then relented and stitched her ebony-hued skin back together. "There, all better now."

"That hurt," Janeka complained. "Not as bad as dying tho'." She laid a hand on her aching chest, feeling the rip in her T-shirt and armor. She really needed better armor. A kevlar vest was not going to cut it any more.

Voreth was more than happy to lead them out the shattered doors and back across the bridge, the obsidian waters roaring deep in the darkness below. Tsukyo was looking around as they walked into the vastness of the Norse underworld, cloying darkness closing in on them.

"So what are we looking for?" Dana finally asked. Her innate curiosity wondered what sort of things would be required to make a knife that could free dread Fenris.

"Hmm? Oh, right." Dolph unrolled the scroll. "The Hunger of Nidhogg? The Fury of Fenris? This might be a bit tricky." It did resemble (in an antithetical manner) the same items gathered to make Fenris's unbreakable ribbon that bound it under its mountain.

Janeka whistled at that. She looked like she wanted to say something, but how do you ask if it was worth your own life? For something that you know is going to happen anyways.

* * *

><p>Sheriff Allen Thompson really hated early Mondays. As sheriff of Carson County he was a busy man and he really did not like part of his new duties which involved kids that left dead, decomposing bodies strewn around and a dozen witnesses describing them opening a gate to hell and walking through it.<p>

His police car came up to the police taped off gate when he saw a young girl jogging along the side of the road. He opened his door to the early morning breeze and tipped back his hat. "Sheila Henderson? So I take it the rest of your people are back?"

"Good morning sheriff. And yes, we just got back from Hel- Helheim, I mean. That would probably be confusing to you what you saw. And its all over the news what they recorded. So much for a lower profile," the girl said as she finished jogging over.

"Awfully blasé about this, aren't you?" the older man said as he tried to stare her down. Usually he could get kids her age to squirm or at least react.

"This sort of thing happens to us." She crouched down and then leaped over the fence to land thirty feet away. "I take it you want to talk to us about all the dead zombies?"

"Shit yes, kid. What the hell are you people?" Like most law enforcement, he knew that there were things that went bump in the night. They did not make it into 'normal' reports because no one wanted to be locked up for being insane. But these people were far higher profile than he had ever heard of.

"Demigods, Sheriff." She kept walking to the door and opened it to let him follow her in.

Inside, Dolph was busy working on his new van again, something that was a normal bit of 'keep himself busy' while he worked out some issues. Janeka was moving in a literal blur around her mechanized armor, doing months of work in just hours.

"Hey, everyone, Sheriff Thompson is here. I think he wants to know we did not murder someone when those zombies attacked," Sheila called out as she breezed in the door.

The sheriff just gave her a look like he thought she had just said the most insane thing possible. "That isn't exactly why I am here."

Dana coughed as she stepped out of the shadow behind him. "Really? Because that would be the first thing I would want to talk about as a policeman."

Sheriff Thompson took off his hat and rubbed his head as he gathered his thoughts. "I guess we have a few too many witnesses about the fact that the bodies were collapsing. Even some good recording from the TV stations. What I thought I was coming here was to ask what you were doing with her body." He pointed at Janeka.

"I got better," the daughter of Ares said cheekily.

"So you managed to get healed up from nearly dying?" the officer asked, his blue-gray eyes looking at her closely.

"We can go with that," she replied.

"How about 'just the facts, ma'am?'" Thompson said dryly as he pulled out his notepad.

"I was assassinated by an Atlantean while the Loa god Baron Samedi was trying to kill one of us and then my friends traveled into the Underworld to bring me back to life?" Janeka's dark chocolate eyes had suddenly turned hard and unfriendly under his questioning. "And now we are busy with the end of the world coming up." She did not sound happy about that at all.

"You understand, I'm a mite disbelieving here. I'm pretty sure that if I wrote down you were killed and brought back to life that I might not get re-elected to dog catcher of Podunkville Nowhere." The sheriff looked unhappy to say the least.

"I'm sure you've had to be creative in writing your reports. No police officer wants to try and explain why a couple of his rookies had to shoot some zombies or fend off a rabid werewolf," Dana said carefully, her voice resonating with her power. "I mean, hopefully we are raising people's awareness of the supernatural without causing an outright panic."

"So pagan gods attacking you guys?" He looked around past Dolph where a very high tech looking turbine engine was set up, then over to the giant robot of black, the long laid out form of the stored rocket that took up most of the huge warehouse and then an interior greenhouse. "You know, I looked up the commercial licenses you guys have here and what you are authorized to work on. The only thing I did not see was a license from the National Regulatory Commission for radiation experiments."

"Fixing things in the world and making a buck off of it at the same time." Dana smiled to let the sting off her words as she subtly captivated him.

"Besides, that's just a license for the handling of radioactive materials. Janeka and I have at least three designs for nuclear reactors here. Only one that we have working runs off of hydrogen," Sheila tried to say helpfully.

"Fusion. No radioactive materials," the daughter of Ares said glibly. Not really a truth, but not exactly the full story either. "I applied for a patent and got a nastygram from the Oil companies about the design. They say it infringes on their patents."

"I thought that was just a urban myth?" Thompson said, feeling more and more bewildered the longer he talked.

Ten minutes later, Janeka and Dana had the poor sheriff convinced he was about to go insane and just wanted to get out before his head exploded.

"He's going to be back later," Dana said after she closed the door.

Dolph shrugged as he flopped back down on his roll-board. "Not like we are going to be here in the morning. Got things to do."

"Places to be. Times to arrive at," Sheila said sagely. "I'm going to go plant my smog scavenger plants outside."

"I didn't think they were complete?" the older black woman said, looking surprised.

"They don't make little oil fruits, no. But they do absorb the smog so far into the seeds, but it will poison the ground if you aren't careful," she explained as she picked up the little plants in their trays. "All the research has been published. I don't want it to go to waste."

Up on the second level, where there was a balcony that led to the private quarters, Voreth frowned. She disappeared back down the hall and into her door, the myriad of clockwork brass locks opened to let her pass into 'her' room. Occult books littered the table even as the pile of candle showed her use of the anachronisms. But on the far side lay a map with geomantic lines all across the Antarctic continent. Her rough, calloused hands traced a line.

Voreth moved to sit down at her table. A small bit of heat softened the wax so she could start writing on the wax. To help her memorize, she spoke aloud as she wrote. "Dolph's spear, the Gate for the Dead, appears to be a more powerful relic than I initially thought and has the potential to be used in the ritual of relocation. Along with Thor's Hammer Mjolnir and Zeus's Lightning Bolt, it could be used to move Atlantis back to its rightful waters in the Indian Ocean. Now I must only seek another three Relics of earth shattering power as I research the most powerful of magics-"

She suddenly grasped at her head as if in pain, then slapped a burning hand down upon the wax writing, melting it to nothing. Her skin seemed to shift and flex as Dorathi came to the forefront. The man pulled his burning hand out of the melted wax, sighing as he realized his situation.

"Sister, what sort of secrets are you keeping now?" the powerfully muscled Atlantean male said even as he shed the unisex tunic and cleaned up the the waxy splatter.

Once that was done, he pulled out his blueprints for a massive device, built with modern understanding and Ancient Atlantean excellence in technology. The device looked like it could lift a mountain, which was actually less than its prodigious strength would eventually carry. Thermal cannons were added, to allow it to melt mountains if needed.

And, if Dorathi finished it, they would never have to be used for violence's sake. Even if it did leave a gash in the ocean floor over a thousand miles wide dragging his homeland back to its proper place.


	7. Time of War

**Chapter 19:  
>Part 1: Lost and Found<strong>

The anachronistic airship creaked as it turned into the wind as it cut through the clouds. Sheila stepped around one of Janeka's robotic minions (with its obligatory 'Roger-Roger' and salute) as she headed to the back of the ship were the boat house was located. The black sails and wings were unfurled on the black behemoth, looking quite unusual for a flying half-ship and half-airplane. Flower-like propellers pushed them forward from the end of the wings. They looked like some sort of fantasy pirate ship.

"Hey, kiddo. Cat got your tongue?" Dana said from the pilot's wheel as she stood there looking through the windows. She was checking their position on the GPS system that was nailed to a wooden control panel. She almost looked like a shadow in her black balaclava and combat gear, though she was not wearing her shadow mask.

"Just trying not to breath too much. We might have cleaned off the undead from when Dolph's doppelganger attacked us, but this ship still smells horrible. With Janeka's bots doing most of the work, I figure I would see how things are before we cross over the land in England and then France," the youngest demigoddess said with a shrug. She was in her own normal outfit, a dull pink long-sleeved T-shirt, blue jeans, hiking boots with her low profile armor underneath.

"Yeah, they were a bit freaked out about our flight plan. You sure you and Tsukyo can't figure out how to make the wind change?" the daughter of Artemis asked curiously.

"Sorry, not really. That falls under 'changing the weather' which the gods protect vigorously as their own domain." Sheila shrugged at that. She could grab someone with the wind and possibly wrestle a tornado into subjugation, but making a breeze was considered somehow 'too powerful' for mortals.

That was when the sound of a helicopter approached from the port side. The scattered puffs of cloud finally broke through showing the British version of the Apache coming up alongside of them. The pilot waved to Dana who waved back, then casually circled the wooden airship that flew in contravenes to the laws of physics.

Dorathi walked up the steep ladder at the back of the bridge. "Tsukyo is nearly done with supper. It appears we were wise to fill the galley with much canned stews." The Atlantean was garbed as he was wont in only a loincloth and sandals.

"Can you bring me up a bowl, Dorathi?" Dana asked. She casually turned the wheel a quarter spin, causing the airship to creak a bit and fight the wind a bit harder.

"Sure." The burly Atlantean slid down the steep ladder to the deck below.

* * *

><p>"Lost things. Things that were not meant to be left in this world," Janeka called out as everyone stood round the anchor of the black airship as it floated overhead. "And that's what brings us here to the Black Forest. Supposedly it connects to the Lost Forest. That oogie-boogie wiggy place that you warn your kids about wandering into because you might get lost forever."<p>

Dorathi nodded. "Yes, it was famous even as far off as Atlantis. To get lost in it was a mortals doom."

"Other forests might allow you to get lost, but we need to make sure we get into it. Everyone has your radio?" Dana said to everyone.

Tsukyo nodded while giving a thumb's up. "You got it, darling."

Two hours later, everyone was getting frustrated. They were still trudging along a path.

"Why isn't this working?" Dana muttered to herself. "We should be lost already."

"But I know exactly where we are. The ship is about five kilometers that direction," the youngest scion said, pointing in a direction unerringly.

"Just shy of it, yeah," Janeka said with a knowing nod.

"Wow, you guys are just like me and can't get lost," Tsukyo said brightly. The son of Susano-O blinked as they all stared at him.

"We're idiots, aren't we?" the pale-haired Aesir said to the much more swarthy daughter of Artemis.

"Yes. We are. Argh. How do we get lost in the woods with three people that really can't get lost?" Dana was bopping the side of her head with her left fist lightly.

"Far be it from me to stop you from beating yourself up, but we do appear to have three people here who look like they could get lost. So pair up?" the ebony dark daughter of Ares said with a bright smile, her white teeth startling in contrast to the rest of her near midnight features.

"I call Janeka," Dolph called out quickly. "We have some stuff to talk about anyways." That got a raised eyebrow from the teen.

"I got Dana!" Tsukyo shouted out gleefully. "Some of her girls have been being a little pushy. I don't care if I have good genes."

Dana winced. "Roxanne again?"

Sheila turned over to Dorathi. "Guess that leaves you and I, oldest and youngest."

The twenty-year old looking demigod raised an eyebrow. "You think they planned it that way?" He started wandering off down a separate path from the others.

Sheila was busy tying a blindfold over her eyes. "Not really, but it doesn't hurt to look for patterns. It's the sign of an active, observant mind." They walked a few minutes more. "Hmm. Still not working."

"This is maddening. When we want to get lost, we can't?" the Atlantean demigod of smithing complained. He didn't even blink or stagger as Sheila jumped on his back. "What are you doing?"

"I could still tell where I was by feeling how far each footstep was. So if you do all the walking I have a better chance of getting lost," the blonde said brightly.

Another ten minutes and Dorathi was starting to get upset. Normally he was a placid fellow, but it had been a trying few months.

"Oh?" Sheila said suddenly. "Are we there yet? I always wanted to say that."

"We have to get lost first," the Atlantean reminded her.

"Yes, but I think you are lost. I can't hear Tsukyo or Janeka any more."

Warm, brown eyes blinked at that as he tried to look around. "I- I guess we are. Finally."

"We better stay together. It would probably be very easy to get lost now. And with three teams, we can track down Dolph's items more quickly," the girl said brightly as she took off her blindfold. The hanky was folded and put in her back pocket.

The much taller Atlantean blinked. "I had not considered that. In fact, I'm not sure any of the others did either."

"I'm sure Dana and Janeka didn't. Dolph might have, but Tsukyo would just go with it." Sheila blinked and looked up into the almost black canopy of dark green oak and birch leaves. "Weird. Is there even a sun up there? And moss on all sides of the trees as far as I can see."

Dorathi just shrugged. "Let us journey then."

* * *

><p>"Why does it always have to be giants?" Janeka asked her overly tall companion. She spun in a pirouette to her left around a massive kick and then sighted down the blade and pulled the trigger. With a hop backwards, she landed at the edge of the small clearing in the middle of the Black Forest. Even here, it was mostly shadows under the limbs of the trees high above them.<p>

Dolph did not bother to answer as he was busy wrestling with the twelve foot tall hill giant. They were near evenly matched and the brutish fellow had a bit extra leverage over his own nearly ten foot tall self. Massive, corded muscles in his shoulders strained and threw back the giant for a second. His spear whirled through the air to block the uprooted tree the giant was using as a club.

The daughter of Ares almost slid across the ground like it was ice even as her gun-blade swept up to take the head off a Fenrir that the giant had kept as a pet.

With a bellow, the giant charged over towards Janeka. "Murderer! Slayer of pets! You bitch!" the giant roared.

The world seemed slow down as Janeka just calmly raised her gun-blade. A red glow shone down the barrel. "Yippey-kay-yay, mother-$% #*^." Ichor flowed in the daughter of Ares as the inimical shot roared fury to the heavens. It almost seemed to home in on the giants beady left eye. Janeka just spun backwards like a matador to let the giant's body slam into the ground where she had been standing.

"Kill-stealer," Dolph grumbled. "I did all the hard work." He gave the young woman a small wink even as he shrank down to his normal six-foot eight inches. "I get no respect even if I do wear the leather pants in this relationship."

Janeka's expressive brown eyes opened wide in surprise, then narrowed in laughter. "But I like you in those pants. I made them just for you out of Nemean hide." She chortled at his small blush.

"I noticed. It's a good thing I've got super-strength, otherwise I probably wouldn't be able to pull them on. They are a lot tight, you know." He knelt down next to the dead giant, distracting her with his pants for a second. "Grab the Eiter?"

"Oh, sure. Giant's blood is always useful." And it would distract her from even hoping that the too-handsome Aesir would ever consider anything with her.

One too-gruesome job later and she had a filled and capped a one liter Mountain Dew bottle filled with black blood. A quick rinse off in a stream and they were back to wandering through the twisted paths in the Black Forest. It was Janeka who first heard the sound of someone walking down the path ahead of them.

That person who was shown to be a totally normal looking man wearing hiking gear. He glanced over his shoulder and quirked an eyebrow at them. His hair was steel gray and his skin tanned from too much sun. "Now that's not something you see often. Usually its the huge black guy and small white gal. You guys are trying to go against convention."

Janeka's good mood had not been lost yet, so she chuckled a bit. "Touché."

"I'm Dolph. This is Janeka," the Aesir said in a untrusting tone.

"I'm Raffin, today a simple traveller using the Black Forest to get where I need to go," the traveller admitted.

"And yesterday not such a simple traveller?" The daughter of Ares blinked her chocolate eyes in surprise. She could sense nothing supernatural about him in the slightest. It was quite disconcerting.

"The worlds are not always so simple, hmm? Come, let us break bread and share drink in the ancient tradition so that we show we are not enemies until at least dawn," Raffin said with a sardonic grin on his face.

"Not sure that's the safest thing," Janeka mumbled.

"Hospitality, it's a big thing among the Aesir and others of the Nine Realms," the son of Hel said as he studied the man in front of him. "Not accepting is as much as declaring him an enemy to be attacked on sight." He had specifically studied up on the customs of the ancient gods and spirits of the Norse.

"Which can be exciting, but is not what my purpose this day. Do you have a cup? I only my one for the golden wine I carry," the stranger said as he held up a small flask covered in Nordic runes.

"That's easy enough." Dolph placed his hand to the hard packed ground. A large rock was pushed up from deep within the earth which he then started to mold into mugs. Two relatively normal sized ones and one extra large for him to more easily fit his huge hands. Each was a work of art befitting a kings table if they had but been gilded in gold or silver.

"Fae wine. Potent stuff, so you should watch out." Just a little bit was added to each cup.

Dolph looked at it dubiously while Janeka touched it to her tongue like Raffin did. With a shrug of his shoulders that intimidated most linebackers, he then upturned the shimmering gold liquid into his mouth. It's not like-

"Whoa-oah," Dolph said as his knees turned wobbly. "I haven't been able to -hic- get drunk in forever."

"Then it is drink well received." His smile was quite charming. "So what brings you on such a dark journey? Searching for a path to the Overworlds?"

"Just looking for lost secrets," the daughter of Ares said glibly before Dolph could reply.

"Say, could I get some more of this?" the son of Hel asked. "I need to figure this brew up so I can still enjoy myself."

The traveller nodded. "A bit more, just don't use it all up before you figure it out." His small flask filled a larger container even as Dolph sampled a bit more.

"That's probably enough for you there. Guess I need to find a place to spend the evening and let him sleep it off," the black teen said with a wry grin on her face.

Raffin nodded. "And I must be off myself. People to meet, places to be. A king's job is never done. Fair thee well, young demigoddess." With that, the hiker gave them a wave as he wandered up the trail.

"That was remarkably odd," Janeka thought aloud. "Come on, big guy." She put his arm over her shoulder and started to guide him to the edge of the clearing. She had spotted a small hollow between the roots of two trees.

"Thanks, Janeka." Dolph's pale skin was a bit flushed from Fae wine.

"Sure, Dolph." She bopped her fist into his stomach. "I can't believe you did that. You're smarter than that."

"That tickled." Like only the truly drunk could do, he got a cunning expression that was far, far too apparent. He stumbled into a roll to the side and onto his back, pulling Janeka down on top of him.

"Hey. What do you think you are doing?" the black girl asked.

"Retaliating," Dolph replied as his huge, deft hands started to try and tickle the daughter of Ares.

She just started to poke at him, far faster and with more agility than the huge Aesir. They play fought and tickled for almost ten minutes. Finally Dolph managed to grab the smaller girl's hands with his own.

"Oh, no. What oh what will I ever do," Janeka said in a very deadpan voice, then grinned at him.

"I can think of something." Dolph's pale blue eyes stared into her eyes deeply, then he leaned forward and kissed her carefully.

"Uh- I mean, are you sure?" There was no way the incredibly handsome young man could be interested-

Dolph just started kissing her again as he let her hands go. His hands started to wander. When he pulled back from his kiss, he looked her deeply into her eyes. "I think we should stay together. Like as in forever." He kissed her again he started to pull her hoodie up off her waist. He grinned a little foolishly, "After all, fate and circumstance keep pushing us together anyways, and I see no reason to fight it . . ."

Janeka only vaguely noticed in the back of her mind that there was something wonky with time happening just a few miles away. Had Dolph really just proposed to her?

* * *

><p>Raffin snorted as he heard the two teens turning to the actions of lovers. He continued to walk down the path to talk to the man he was supposed to meet. The mysteries of the Lost Wood were an old friend to him, so he was easily able to get where he wanted. "You can come out, Kane Taoka."<p>

"I thought you had agreed to deal with those insufferable demigods?" the Asian traitor of the gods demanded. His tattooed arms were visible, the shadow dragon depicted moving across his tanned skin as he stepped out of the shadows.

"I said I would see what I could do, but they were too wary." The hiker's visage melted away as he suddenly grew three inches, his skin darkened to deep shadow and his hair turned pale yellow. King Fafnir, liege lord of the Dark Elves of Norse myth, stood revealed. "After all, it's certainly not possible that I could be constrained from any actions." This was an understatement of epic proportions. Hel was actually wanting this stripling to be groomed as her heir. What could she be thinking?

"You belong to the Titans! They are going to be free. I've seen it," the traitor son of Amaterasu snarled out. "You saw my signet, signed by the king of the fire giants himself, Surtur! Are you wanting to be burned to ash in Ragnarok?" How dare this upstart Titanspawn dare betray him.

"He's in the future. Oh yes, little demigod, I can see that you travel from that when, just like I can see that Dolph and his friends travelled from the future and into the past to get to this time of now. Such secrets are things that are mine to pluck from the tree of knowledge. But Hel is now and wished that I interfere, giving him the Fae wine. Reward and leverage for her machinations." Fafnir stood tall in his silver and black-purple finery, unworried by the powerful demigod in front of him. Things you cared for could be used against you.

"I will see you rot in darkness forever, traitor!" Kane shouted in anger. His normally handsome Asian features were twisted, giving evidence to the depths of his evil.

"All of the Dökkálfar are born of rot and darkness, little shadow. We are but maggots, gnawing at the corpse of Ymir. Do you wish to test me? I carry the Ring of Andvaranaut and could curse you before you could do anything?" He held up his fist to show a ring of gold, made of small leaves entwined around his finger with impossible craftsmanship.

"This will not be forgotten, king of the maggots. Never put your back to the shadows," the scion of Amatsu-Mikaboshi called out, even as he faded into darkness.

Fafnir smirked. "Hel would make my torment last centuries while I pleaded for her to kill me. Your threats are meaningless." With a jaunty wave to the departed, he started whistling as he headed deeper into the Black Forest.

* * *

><p>The crack of thunder and his punch sent another ninja flying into a tree. "Girlfriend, we have got to stop meeting this way," Tsukyo quipped as he almost flickered over to yet another ninja to kick him in the face.<p>

Dana rolled her eyes under the Mask of the Moon and Darkness. "So shadow ninja? That's the guy Sheila mentioned was involved in the attack on Dolph's birthday party. Kane?"

"Yeah, for a scion of Amaterasu, he sure likes his shadows," the son of Susano-O complained. He spun around and hit a dragon made of shadows straight on with his storm augmented fist. The Eastern dragon roared as it spun through the air like a corkscrew to splat like ink against the trees of the Black Forest.

Dana, the daughter of Artemis tensed as she heard lumbering crash of brutes coming through the trees. "It appears he was using the ninja to force us to make enough noise to attract a tribe of trolls and their Fenrir."

"How many?" Tsukyo asked as he dispatched two more silent shadow-ninja with a spin-kick and a back punch.

"A dozen. And they will probably track us for days," Dana replied truthfully.

"Let's ambush them. I want to show this Kane that his threats aren't going to be enough to stop us," Tsukyo said, sounding more serious than he was normally wont to show. The sixteen year old Asian-American nodded determinedly at the older woman.

"Bring down a fog and freeze the Fenrir first. Then we'll kill the trolls one by one," Dana decided after a moment.

"Sounds like a plan, darling." Tsukyo gestured to a small stream trickling through the forest, turning it into mist that he started to spread out. The Black Forest became a much darker, colder and somehow more intimidating place.

The eight foot tall stooped over figures of the Trolls stopped as their keen senses noted the change. Snaggle-toothed grins turned down in frowns even as they started to look around. Kane Taoka had promised them demigod flesh to dine on after they ran their prey down.

Their Fenrir slaves started to howl and snap at the end of the chains, acting for the moment like simple wolves.

"They come," the Alpha of the Fenrir called out. It was the last thing he said as a silver scythe swished out of the shadowy mists and removed his head.

Dana had pulled the mystery of the New Moon about her. She was nearly invisible and with a simple leap, jumped through the branches to land on the other side of the Trolls like a ghost.

Another pair of Fenrir were pierced and frozen to death as the mist howled down on them and turned to water and then ice. Tsukyo was a wraith as he flitted around on a breeze.

Kane Taoka raged as he pulled out a three foot scepter from a loop on the belt across his back. They were supposed to be hunted down and killed, not turn hunter on his minions. He struggled to control the Scepter of Infinite Moments, but managed to finally open a portal.

He needed more dangerous minions to kill these demigods!

* * *

><p>As the last pair traced a curving path barely big enough for the Atlantean, Sheila finally spoke up. "So, Dana was saying that in the Black Forest that paths lead to the lost. But what we are really seeking is lost knowledge."<p>

"True. So we should both try to focus on that, rather than the Murder of the Mayhem?" Dorathi was not sure exactly why they had decided on that ephemeral item, but Sheila had been insistent earlier. Something about how Janeka would likely take the first item on the list that did not require talking to his relatives and Dana would take the last item because she would know what Janeka would pick. So they picked something in the middle. Now she wanted to change her mind?

"Yes. A place of lost lores and knowledge that will guide us to the ephemerals that will allow us to craft a knife that can cut his leash." Speaking of freeing Fenris was not wise, in Sheila's eyes. Especially out in the open.

That was when an animal's yowl cut through the trees.

Both demigods stopped to listen. The handsome Atlantean's face looked incredulous after a moment, as if what he heard was impossible.

"That sounded like a cat, but not quite right." It had been deeper and more throaty, Sheila decided.

"It is a pack of Atlantean Tiger-Sharks. They were never allowed to leave their coast. They are similar to the terrors of the Nemean boars, lions and bears your gods allow near Olympus," Dorathi said with a grin. "Dangerous to heroes and weak demigods." He encased his hands in fire.

Sheila glanced over towards the tall, swarthy features for just a second as suspicion suddenly sprang to mind. Ichor was sent burning through her veins as she focused more on her senses. She pulled her silver pistol, Athena's Wit, and the black sword, Hadecleus, from their shadow space. "I guess we could use the hide for more Relic armor."

Two trees were knocked out of the way as a figure that looked like the most menacing parts of a great white shark and a white and black tiger appeared, easily the size of a small motorhome. A moment later and a second one appeared, smashing through another massive oak tree.

The smell of ozone drifted lightly from behind them as Sheila spotted the shadowy figure of Kane Taoka hiding behind a huge oak that was covered in moss. He seemed to have an utterly satisfied smile.

A smile that dropped when the youngest demigoddess dropped into a spin that ended up with her sword in the gut of a Attan, an Atlantean assassin behind her! With a woosh, she gestured with Athena's Wit to send the wind to grab another invisible Attan. Feeling by touch through her feet for their footsteps in the ground and the smell of ozone from their weapons had worked out perfect!

"Wha-!?" Dorathi asked as he looked over his back. "Where did they come from? Oh, right. Sneaky assassins." A bonfire blazed from his hands to engulf the nearest assassin even as the Tiger-Sharks roared out, then charged.

Kane seethed as he watched ambush blow up in his face. He needed the Atlantean demigod captured and the youngest scion killed. Why could he not kill them before they ruined his plans? It should not be this hard to forestall them-

Sheila ripped the sword Hadecleus out of the Attan's stomach through her left side in a spray of blood. She dipped down and then leaped upward in a spin, using her left toes to pivot around the branch. Even as her feet landed on the foot wide branch high in the air, Athena's Wit fired a lethal, inimical shot at the hiding Amatsukami demigod.

Kane spun around from the impact as the 10mm bullet hit with the force of a sniper shot. His hand went up to his bloodied shoulder as he realized he was being attacked.

"How-? How dare you!" the real leader of the Shinsengumi yelled. His shadow dragon erupted from the tattoos covering his shoulders.

Fire blazed up around Dorathi as he leaped forward to avoid the snap of rows of shark teeth, leaving a trail of white fire that burned the Nemean monster as they tried to bite at him. He dashed around their tails that could saw through trees due to their rough skin. The Tiger-Sharks started to snap and bite anything, frenzying in fear and fury. Kane's tattoo dragon, looking bedraggled as it was not fully healed leaped from branch to branch, chasing the youngest Greek demigoddess as she swished through the trees.

"Come on. Damn you, work," the traitor demigod complained. It took such an effort of will and focus to use the stolen scepter. He dashed through the trees, looking up and over his shoulder.

Sheila sliced through the branch she was leaping off, just a moment before Kane's shadow-dragon landed. With a snap, it was sent tumbling to the ground over a hundred feet down. Athena's Wit blasted another bullet into the Amatsukami's back.

Kane snarled, absolutely livid as he realized he was in real danger of being killed here and now. He grabbed the large scepter off his back again. Time warped and wobbled around him and in a flicker, he finally disappeared as he controlled the Relic for just long enough.

"Time travel. How the hell can Kane time travel?" Sheila muttered as her new sense of time resounded with his fleeing into the past through a momentary portal. She dashed down the trunk of the tree in a flicker of motion, only taking time to snap a bullet into the shadow-dragon to make it burst into a spray of ink.

The heavily muscled Atlantean demigod was busy pounding on the last remaining Nemean Tiger-Shark that was attempting to bite off his arm and bare chest. Sheila chambered a single bullet separately into her heavy, silver-bright pistol.

Athena's Wit roared a final time, the bullet carved from a single Nemean tooth slicing through nearly impregnable hide like it was nothing and scattering its brains. Dorathi then pried open the jaws by main, supernatural strength. He was breathing hard and a bit in shock. His trembling seemed to be getting worse.

"Don't worry, Dorathi," Sheila promised as she skidded to a halt next to the Atlantean. With a surge, she healed the most serious, scarring wounds to mere bruises.

The trembling did not subside until the form wavered and then left the panting figure of Voreth behind. "What happened?" the stunned Atlantean demigoddess asked as she looked around, her long hair and braids whipping through the air.

"Ah, Dorathi got a bit hurt, but I healed most of it. Has trauma ever caused you to switch before?" the youngest demigoddess asked in surprise as she put Athena's Wit and Hadecleus back into shadow-space.

"Occasionally. There are times when my magic is better used than his mastery over earth and fire. Or the opposite can rarely happen." Voreth stood up, testing her light brown, bruised flesh. With a small surge of ichor, she healed some of the bruises. "So where, exactly, are we?"

"The Lost Forest to seek those ephemeral items," Sheila said as she nodded at the self-healing. "There's a stream just over there so you can remove the blood. I'll just harvest the Nemean hides and then join you." She had some great ideas on how to get the most of the supernaturally tough material.

"Very good." Voreth was studying the area, feeling the magic of the Lost Forest.

* * *

><p>It was a day later that the two demigoddesses stepped out of the forest into a small clearing. The sun was still hidden overhead, but seemed as bright as noon still. A set of moss-encrusted lintel-arches made of tons of gray rock stood in a circle around three rectangular rocks in the middle.<p>

"Standing stones? Why would the forest lead us here?" Sheila asked her companion. At least it had not dumped them in the middle of a city where Voreth's Atlantean belt and diaphanous pantaloons (her only clothing) would cause a scene with her half-naked form.

Voreth nodded. "Supposedly a great secret is kept within its crystal center. But you must remember, no violence is allowed in that true place. Not even the gods and titans can break that law."

Sheila closed her eyes, trying to sense the ephemeral with her more than human senses. Outside the circle, little pale white mushrooms started to pop up outside the stone circle as the Fae trap was sprung. In less than one minute, the would fall asleep and into the sway of the Unseelie Sidhe.

"Beware, something evil comes," Voreth called out. "We should flee through the touchstone." The statuesque Atlantean was feeling her hackles rise even as her head twisting left and right set her braids swishing. She called forth her fires just as Sheila reached back and grabbed the back of her belt loop.

"Come on," the daughter of Athena called out even as she winced from the pain of sticking her hand into a bonfire. She drew upon her legend, drawing them through the mystical touchstone to the true Standing Stones.

Kane Taoka seethed from the shadows as the mushroom that surrounded the moss covered standing stone finally reached two feet tall, unfurled and released their psychotropic and soporific inducing spores. The Unseelie had failed him also! Why could he not stop them?

"Perhaps Ixion? He would hate Janeka because of their father," the traitor said to himself. He had to figure out a way to stop them from saving Athena when they would soon meet.

The shifting of shadows wavered as the sun disappeared and all that was left was a grassy flat curve of the ground. Light glinted off a massive edifice, crystalline stone fifty feet tall as Sheila and Voreth appeared far off from the magical genesis of the Standing Stones.

The younger hissed in pain as she pulled her hand back, even as Voreth crumpled to the ground with her fire aura snuffed out. Sheila blinked in confusion. Then narrowed her eyes in concentrated thought. "I guess this place is really strict. No injuring anyone, even on accident."

The Atlantean looked fine other than being unconscious. Sheila studied her hand closely, wishing her power of seeing and understanding the injury and health of someone worked on herself. She grinned to herself as she considered that she still had eyes and had a great deal of medical training.

Her whole hand was covered in white, leathery burned. It worryingly did not hurt. Ichor surged through her blood and she watched as her half-divine flesh healed without even a scar. She then looked over at the unconscious Atlantean. Her healing insight could tell instantly that she was not injured in any way and would wake up shortly.

With infinite care to not inflict even a bump or bruise, the smaller girl picked up the much larger woman and started walking towards the crystal standing stones at a pace that outdid most sprinters. Being mindful of the 'do not hurt anyone' rule, she even kept herself from even crushing the grass with footsteps so light that they barely bent.

Voreth started shaking her head and then was suddenly awake. "What happened?"

"You accidentally injured me as we arrived and were knocked out. I will have to remember to not grab you when you engulf yourself in fire. Or make myself immune to regular fire. Hmm. A relic would not be that hard. And I could make myself immune to cold at the same time." Sheila's mind was already whirling through the possibilities as she split off four parts to start the process of mentally designing the different items she was interested in investing in to protect against the base elements.

The Atlantean wriggled free to stand on the grass, looking at the crystals around them. "The heart of Logos. He is actually one of the Titans that we Atlanteans convinced to limit himself so that thought and intellect could flower and grow."

"I had no idea about that. I wonder if that's why so much of the information on the war against the Titans was lost?"

Voreth nodded as she put her hand on the center piece of crystal, easily the size of a small car. She closed her hard eyes and relaxed, losing the severe appearance that she alway gave off. Then she smiled. "Ah, that's what that means and how you use relics in a spell. Interesting."

Sheila glided up, still not crushing the grass below her. She focussed all of her mind's quite prodigious intellect and all tracks of her consciousness upon the crystal. She just gave off pure curiosity as she absorbed everything she could about this strange, magical place.

And something awoke as the pure concept of thought and logic responded. It showed her that this place was Logos's voluntary prison within his own Titan Realm. The crystal standing stones were a pure conduit to the buried mind that lay with this self-sustaining reality. His oaths of nonviolence he enforced on all visitors. The tendrils of thought showed how Coeus of the Dodekatheon and Itraius of Atlantis were his Titan Avatars, content to only think so that thought could have order at its very basis.

Sparkling white lights flashed into existence within the crystal arches as Logos considered and thought. He alone of the greater Titans was capable of this, even if his mind and intellect was too much for mortals. Sparks of too-bright motes of sunlight that were pure concept and understanding swirled around the totally shocked Voreth as the Titan considered. Nine sparks flew from his mind and gently touched Sheila's lithe form one at a time.

With groan she staggered under the first, then swooned under the second. Around her neck, the amulet Athena's Wisdom started to heat up as its ability to amplify her intellect was sorely tested. Her mind was already on the cusp of becoming truly divine but was fighting a crushing weight of knowledge that she had never imagined before. She gasped out loud in pain at the third.

A vision of Sheila holding onto the Mirror of Antoniss as it seethed with power while the exiled Atlantean gods fought to return. In slow motion, the mirror cracks and shards explode outwards and through her and the others in a manner that sliced through their very existence. Flickers of other worlds appeared in the shards that disappeared after passing through her and her companions.

Once again Sheila sees on the gods of Olympus as they celebrated their ancient victory over the Titans. Wise Paellas Athena sat calmly among the rambunctious gods, her gray eyes judging all carefully as she supped and drank. Flashes of her now greater insight showed the goddess being distracted for just a second during the meal and strangely ignoring a fly in her hair next to her ear.

The next vision showed the birth of Athena as the deformed Hephaestus chopped an axe into Zeus's head, releasing an explosion of ichor and mists into the air. As shown in many depictions, she appears in her full regalia; spear, shield, helm and breastplate. For a long moment Athena stands tense with an implacable will, her forearm muscles coiled under her skin. Her gray eyes look first left and then right as Zeus stands back up with the wound healing miraculously. The King of the Gods suddenly smiles and holds out his arms in greeting, having avoided fate and prophecy of his son supplanting him. Yet there is the smallest suggestion of confusion from the new Goddess of Wisdom and War.

The sparks of light pull back from the girl as a hint of surprise.

"What is this?" Veroth asked as she held Sheila by her shoulder.

"I think Logos was trying to show me something." Sheila's blue-green eyes looked up at the taller woman. "I think I might be in the middle of something of far greater magnitude that we could imagine."

The Atlantean just laughed at that. "Oh? And what is that?"

"I think we do not know my mother as much as we think we do." The young demigoddess closed her eyes, bringing up the vision of Athena being born. "She was 'born' from Zeus's head after he had swallowed the pregnant Titaness Metis." Her forehead scrunched down slightly. "Born as a goddess of war, ready to fight."

"Yes, even in Atlantis we had heard of this wondrous thing." Voreth was getting impatient.

"Girded for war. Ready for war." Sheila's eyes snapped open and she turned towards the older woman with a very worried expression on her face. "Where did she get her arms and armor? And why did a goddess of wisdom break free from Zeus ready for battle?"

The statuesque woman opened her mouth to answer, then stopped. Confusion grew her face as she realized that she did not have 'why' or 'how'. "You are thinking too much about this. It just is."

"Then we aren't looking hard enough-" Sheila started to retort when it hit her like a thunderbolt. "Metis is not trapped in Zeus. In the legends, she stayed swallowed and trapped. Eventually it became known that this was the source of Zeus's wisdom in his lower belly. But Zeus isn't known for being wise. In fact, he's generally known for not being very wise at all. And there was a fly in Athena's hair."

"So one of his paramours is free. What of it?" Voreth really thought this was silly.

"A Titan has been loose for thousands of years after being wronged. Swallowed whole like Kronus did his children. A Titan of magical cunning and renowned wisdom that no one has heard of since." Sheila's hackles were rising even as she set her hand down on the almost transparent crystal in front of her.

Voreth started laughing. "So both of our mothers are traitors. How appropriate. Yours just has not gotten herself caught."

The young teen glared at the taller woman, angry beyond words. "This isn't funny!"

"Just decide which side you are on, little girl. Will you join your mother and overthrow the gods like Zeus did his own father? Or will you betray your mother for those on Olympus?" Voreh used her left hand to raise her chin so they could look into each other's eyes. "Or will your forge your own path?"

"I think our group is already forging our own path, Voreth." Sheila pulled herself away from the unwanted touch. "Maybe we don't know everything. Athena and Metis may just be content in their place."

She was lying to herself now. Athena had invented a scientifically based time machine to go back to the Titan War and steal the secrets of godly time travel. You did not do that if you were not planning on using it. Her own ring was forged with the same ichor of Chronus.

The mystic nodded. "We must trust in our magic to lead us. Let us hunt the bloody murder."

* * *

><p>Sheila and Voreth made it back first, though empty handed. They now had some information on how to find the 'bloody Mary', a strange spirit that attacked innocents by travelling through mirrors. Voreth had disappeared into her room with some books and scrolls, while Sheila sat at a desk calculating numbers for a hot fusion device. She and Janeka were very close to a 'mundane' version that could be licensed.<p>

Tsukyo and Dana were next to get back.

"Hey, girl!" the son of Susano-O called out cheerfully. "We got the Despair of the Dwarves."

Dana rolled her eyes as she held up a small bottle. It sloshed with a gray liquid that seemed to absorb light. "Ephemera, tricky to bottle."

"We got some information on the murderous ephemera, but we have to figure out the right mirror world to enter. Voreth and I both think its some sort of specific terra incognita, but its a matter of finding the correct key mirror." Sheila gave them a shrug.

They chatted a bit, then headed to their rooms. Dana wanted to check a few of her books to try and see if she could figure out the key mirror.

So it was as Sheila was scowling at some numbers on a white-board the next day that Dolph and Janeka. They appeared to be fairly cheerful and relaxed.

"You guys sound like you got lucky? So what did you get?" Sheila asked curiously.

They shared a quick glance, then Dolph coughed into his hand. "I was told that my grandmother has already given me the Terror of the Trolls. So it sounds like we are going time travelling again."

"As for lucky, well... I landed myself a boyfriend." Janeka gave a very wide, shit-eating smile.

"Um, congratulations? So, back to the past again? I'm pretty sure that's a power I don't have yet." The youngest scion frowned as she flipped over the white-board. "So another technological time machine?"

"That's going to take months of work," the daughter of Ares complained.

"It's more a logistics problem now. We know it's doable, you cracked the science. We just need a better power supply and to make sure it does not meltdown every time we use it," Sheila was ticking off items on her fingers.

"And we want it to be portable and affecting itself so we don't have to recreate it in the past with less tools," the Aesir noted in a no-nonsense manner. "Janeka can make it immune to fire while I add a magical heatsink."

"So lets get started," Janeka said with a grin on her face.

* * *

><p><strong>Part 2: Heavy Metal and Mayhem.<strong>

It was sixteen hours later that they heard the sound of motorcycles and yelling coming closer from outside. Janeka, Dana and Sheila immediately grabbed for weapons.

"Dolph, we have incoming," the daughter of Ares called out. A touch on her Chaos Watch summoned her fully functional 'war-strider' class armor. With a leap backwards in a flip, she landed in its nearly perfectly fitted interior as it started to light up. It was fifteen feet tall and was fairly similar to the larger power armors seen in some Japanese anime. Smooth, bulbular and almost organic looking in gray and black.

The Aesir was 'gearing up' himself as he grew to huge proportions and took up his spear from its shadow space. Sheila summoned her own armor. While it was large and bulky, it was of 'merely human' size.

Dana was quickly warning Tsukyo and Voreth that there was something incoming.

The two demigoddesses of war just finished donning their armor as a large form smashed through the lowered roll-door at the docking entrance.

"Yeehaaaw!" shouted the strange figure. Someone had merged motorcycles with men to create strange cyber-centaurs. The lead centaur was a hulking half-man and Harley roadster armed with a chainsaw hand.

"Come on, Charlie! Let's spill some blood," said the woman who was riding his motorcycle seat. She set the shotgun in her hand and fired at the least armored figure she saw. "Get some revenge!"

The almost twenty foot tall tall Aesir glared at her attempting to hurt him. He pulled back his arm just as Sheila shouted, "We need some of them alive!"

So Dolph only clotheslined three of them instead of hitting one with the spearpoint.

"Ah, dammit," Janeka grumbled.

Dana appeared out of a shadow like a shot through a cloud. Her sickle came down hard and chopped the rear wheel of one of the Horsemen down and sent him skidding. "Why?"

"Temporal intersections. We need to interrogate them." And potentially not kill them in the future so they could be here. Sheila charged forward with surprising quickness. Her new armor was bulky, making her look about the size of an adult male but she was still faster than almost anyone in actual speed. So she slipped under the chainsaw, then slapped the girl off the seat and the broke the drive chain with a snap of her wrist.

"What? That's not fair," the biker complained even as he rolled to a halt. He turned and tried to fire his gun, but it really was far too late.

It was literally only moments of work for the six demigods (as Tsukyo and Voreth had shown up) to defeat each of the supernatural entities without killing a single one. They then tied them up with lengths of chains, even the two normal mortals.

Dana walked over to the Charlie and placed her hand on his face. "You are going to tell me everything."

The wild looking half-man hocked a loogie at her. "Dream on, bitch."

He suddenly could not take his eyes off of her mask. "Dreams? You will fear to sleep when I am done."

Janeka nodded as she flicked a fire into her hand from a metal lighter. Charlie could feel the heat and then a glare of sunlight behind the demigoddess as Tsukyo glowed with the power of the noon Sun. Sheila nodded to herself, hitting him with the fearsome aspect of the cold, perfect soldier.

Through this all, the cyber-centaur had stood firm against her. He jerked and then started gasping as if he were in a panic.

"Do you want another five years of prison, Charlie?" Dana asked after she released him from the judging power that had entrapped his mind for just a moment. But a soul can not tell time, so could only beg for release.

"I'll talk! Just don't send me back there!" he screamed horridly. "You were so much weaker just six months ago. How could you become so strong?"

"Who sent you?" the daughter of Artemis demanded.

"He said his name was Ixion, the son of Ares," Charlie said as beads of sweat dripped down his face.

"My half-brother," Janeka growled, making the flames flicker higher.

"He gave us more equipment and then said we had to tie you up for a while. But he did not say anything else," the biker said.

The other bikers were staring at him as if he were crazy. "Shut up, you traitor!" his rider shouted.

"All of these guns came from Ixion?" Tsukyo asked, his soft amber eyes looking over the weapons. At Charlie's frantic nod, he picked up an older, worn looking shotgun. "Oh, you poor baby. Don't you worry, I'll get you cleaned up and fixed. Promise."

The other demigods all listened in surprise, then understanding as the Japanese demigod used a trick that all of his pantheon knew to speak to the small god within the gun.

"Ixion was hired by Taoka Kane to distract us for an hour. Kane didn't say why, but the honorable shotgun overheard him mention that he was going to be meeting up with Amatsu Mikaboshi to stop Athena's interference once and for all," the young Japanese-American said.

"So we don't need to know where Kane is," Sheila suddenly said. "We just need to go to where my mother Paellas Athena is."

"I can do that, but I have to have something fate bound to her," Dana said. She was already pulling out her mystic bones.

"You have me. Let's first make sure if she's in the mortal world," the youngest girl ordered softly.

The results of Dana's spell did not show a trace of a path to her mother.

"Underworld or Overworld?" Voreth asked in way of explaining other worlds that Athena had to exist in at this moment, as the spell would not show her in other worlds.

"It won't be the Overworld," Dana said instantly. "Tackling a goddess in the Overworld is very stupid."

Dolph's spear clanged into the concrete as power gathered. First one pillar, then a second exploded from the ground as he focused his legend into smashing the gateway between the mortal world and the Underworld of the Aesir.

The bikers just gaped stared at the raw power as the six demigods dashed through the iron wrought gates and across the fetid waters that ran under the roots of Yggdrasil. Dana was already chanting as she brandished her pouch of finger bones.

"She's here. Off in that distance," the daughter of Artemis called out as she pointed off into the stifling darkness.

"We need to go as fast as possible," Janeka decided. "Sheila and I are fastest. I'll carry Dolph-"

"-and I'll carry Voreth," Sheila continued along.

Dolph just rubbed his forehead in aggravation. He hated to look bad and being carted around by someone less than half his size bruised his ego slightly.

"Guess I'm carrying you, darling," Tsukyo said with a wide smile.

"Only if I start falling behind," the black garbed and masked woman said with aplomb.

The four runners took off at their best speed. It was quickly apparent that Dana was starting to lag slightly behind, which made things clumsy as they had to follow her lead.

"Come on, Dana," Sheila complained.

"Fine." Dana grabbed Tsukyo's shoulders as the now-trio of runners pushed on faster.

Sheila started to twist time, speeding up for them all. The son of Susano-O decided that it was slightly too dark even for his discerning eyesight. The wind was nearly roaring in their ears as Dana pointed out the path ahead. Their speed was so great that when they came across the River Styx that they merely kept running, only the soles of their shoes getting wet. The roar of anger as they flashed by Charon's ferry was deafening as the demon god turned his boat to try and follow.

But they were far and away, on a desperate mission of Fate and Destiny.

Dana was the first to notice that the water on the river was shaking. She kept her eyes glued to the thread of destiny that her spell was illuminating ahead of her. "Goddess," Dana breathed out. She could not see anything ahead yet, but was already feeling buried under the power and essence of the beings ahead of them.

Her path led them off the Styx and up a cliff that all three of them could easily run up the side of. All of them felt like they had slammed into a wall, collapsing for a second as the perfect Avatar of War: The General grappled against the Avatar of Travel: The Way. The spear The General wielded could not be blocked, it could not be parried as it sundered the heaven and sought to wound The Way, but the Avatar of all places and none was simply there and not there. Space collapsed and bent, trying to entrap War, only to be perfectly parried with impossible skill.

They towered as if they strode the sky, smashing into each other with the fundamental, mystical basis of reality without regard for merely mortals or lesser gods. Tartarus rose up behind them as the massive, stone backdrop of their incredible battle.

"We can't get involved in that," Tsukyo shouted as even his inhuman dexterity was taxed to stay on his feet. "We'll be destroyed in an instant."

"That's Athena. I had forgotten how overwhelming the gods can become when the imbue their aspects into fundamental reality," the daughter of Artemis called out.

"It's an attack on Athena, but how can we affect that?" the dark skinned Janeka shouted as she summoned her new armor. The warstrider class powersuit hissed, whirred and ka-chunked around her.

Dolph had a snarl on his face as he held himself back from throwing himself against the overwhelming force of The Way.

"Look for something of or below our power that we can affect," the youngest girl suddenly said. "Even heroes have humbled the gods when they struck at the right moment." She was sent to one knee but she, Janeka and Dana were already straining their senses.

It was Janeka that spotted the skulking shadows first. "There!" she called out softly, pointing into the darkness. "It's that bastard Kane Taoka!" And her half-brother Ixion.

"I see him. Just under a mile away. GO!" Sheila shouted, charging forward at full speed, her sword Hadecleus and Athena's Wit in her hand. The atmosphere boomed with shattering, sonic force as she went faster than ever before, just a second behind her dark-skinned cousin.

Kane was starting to move, an ornate spear covered in runes in his right hand. That was when both cosmic powers resumed their merely godly and immortal visages.

"You are bound, Mikaboshi! I know not how you could escape your shackles, but you will not disrupt thousands of years in planning. The time will be perfect," Athena called out to the shadowy Titan of the Amatsukami in front of her.

"Paellas Athena..." The bone-white mask of the titan floated in the air, the only visible sign of the pure darkness of his presence. "You hid in the dark of your soul your greatest secret, even as your father heaped accolades upon you. I know the shadows in your heart, even as you desperately foster heroes." The noh mask's mouth did not move to form words, they just existed. "In you lies the seeds of the destruction of Olympus."

"You speak lies-" Athena countered, her grey eyes flashing in anger.

That was when Kane struck out with the legendary spear that had laid low the elder beings that had wrought reality into existence, straight to Athena's unsuspecting back. Even as he struck, his free left hand grabbed for a scepter hidden in the folds of her tunic's back. Between him and the band of demigods, Ixion stepped up with his military K-bar as he saw them charging in to attack.

Janeka's Blaze of Battle boomed loudly as she fired on the run, which slowed her for just a second. Ixion's expression filled with pained surprise, causing him to falter as Sheila flickered past him; time and speed intertwined as she tried to forestall the attack against her mother from behind.

Thunder sounded as Hadecleus diverted the spear so it only stabbed into her side instead of her heart. The titan slaying spear went flying into the darkness.

"What?" the goddess of war and wisdom asked as she clasped her hand to her bleeding wound.

Kane's face was filled with fear, even as he held the scepter he had been aiming for. He looked over as the sturdy Ixion stupidly held his chest where the ruins of his heart had existed. "Where the hell did you come from, meddler?" he asked of Sheila, even as he pivoted around.

With a thump, Ixion expired in the Underworld, killed by his sister that he had hated so horribly.

"Kane Taoka, you can not stand against a goddess. Athena will slay you. Give me me the Scepter of Eternity," Mikoboshi demanded as the porcelain noh mask twisted in anger.

The rest of the band appeared, encircling Kane even as he desperately twisted away from Dolph's deadly grave-digger spear. "You aren't supposed to be here! This was supposed to be my moment of triumph! Athena dying, her scepter that allows mastery of time and my ascension to godhood!" Kane snarled out.

"You're all alone, Kane," Janeka bluffed as she pointed her 60mm plasma cannon at him.

Dana had her sickle out, spinning and ready for a throw while Tsukyo's gloves creaked as he clenched his fists tight. Voreth was alight with fire the moment that Tsukyo had dropped her off.

"I am never alone," Kane said. "Amaterasu birthed me, but never graced her misbegotten son with her light. So I took up the cause of the titans and of evil. Father! Mikaboshi! I give myself over fully! Give me the power to destroy these demigods! Fill my ichor with your all encompassing darkness!"

"Knew there was something wrong about him," Janeka muttered. "Kill him-" she then shouted loudly.

The shadows struck first, engulfing Kane Taoka and forcing power upon the unprepared.

"Stop him!" Athena called out even as Kane started laughing.

And then time changed. Power rushed into the relic that Athena had crafted from the stolen ichor of Chronus, the ancient Titan that was, in some indescribable way was Time. Kane screamed in pain as his unprepared and only semi-immortal body struggled to control the threads of time that he had grabbed hold of.

And for just a second, time shattered like a crystal hitting a stone floor. And everyone present was blasted away as time and space groaned under the strain, trying to piece itself back together. For just a moment, their veils were pulled back as three, shadowy sisters appeared over everyone, weaving frantically; the youngest pulling the yarn out of the firmament, the middle knitting it into the tapestry of reality and the last one, bent over and crooked, snipping each thread.

* * *

><p>Sheila spat out sand as she came to in the dawn's bright light. She blinked as she took in the five shapes of her band. Dolph was already standing up.<p>

"Damn it, he got away," the handsome Aesir shouted. "He did that shadow step thingie." His sturdy constitution had allowed him to recover first.

"Where was he looking," Janeka asked with a groan as she sat up. She might be in massive power armor, but that did not help a lot when you you were hit with space-time attacks. "Not picking up the right carrier signals. Almost silent."

That was when the dull, deep throated roars of monoplanes in dives screamed by overhead.

"Zeroes?" Tsukyo asked as he scrambled to his feet.

"Tsukyo, where are we?" Janeka demanded, even as Voreth looked at her in confusion as she brushed off the sand off her scantily clad body.

"Pearl Harbor?" he replied as the Japanese-American winced.

"December 7th, 1941," Sheila and Janeka chorused out as they reached out with their new time sense.

The attack that led to the United States joining the war against the Axis.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 20: War in Time<strong>

"I'm getting sick and tired of being thrown through time. Ya know, it's just not funny any more," Janeka complained as she played with the strings on her hoodie. She was staring out into the ocean, studying what ships were visible.

Sheila was ticking things off on her mental checklist. "We need to track Kane Taoka down before he figures out how to use that rod that he stole from Athena."

Dolph frowned. "Because now is the only time that we can stop him?"

"If we can take it away from him before he becomes a god, he won't be able to use those powers," Dana said in eagerness. "Controlling time... I surmised that it was banned by all the gods so that they can't do these sort of things."

"Wait a second..." The young Japanese-American looked between Sheila and Janeka for a couple of moments. "But you guys have items that allow you to manipulate time. So it's not that special any more."

Sheila looked over at her older cousin who gave a small shrug of her shoulders.

"That's easy to explain. We stole the ichor of Chronus at the same time and place that Athena did, in the deepest pits of Tartarus where the greater titans are imprisoned. It's most likely banned," Sheila said in explanation.

"You don't know?" he asked.

Dolph fielded this question with a frightening grin upon his too-handsome face, his eyes shadowed under his light blond hair. "If we don't ask, we can't say that we knew to not do it. Probably won't save us as gods don't believe ignorance of their laws is an excuse, but it might give us enough wiggle room to start talking very, very fast."

"And Dolph, Janeka and I are very good at talking. We might even keep our heads," Dana said with an absolutely serious look on her face.

"What about us?" Voreth demanded, sounding almost angry. Her weathered, calloused hands clenched hard enough to creak out loud.

"We'd try to help you, too. But really, you might have to beg for your life or sell your best feature to keep your head," Dana said bluntly.

The ancient demigoddess glared at them. "That is a weak hope to wish upon."

"Just don't mention it to anyone unless they bring it up," the daughter of Ares said with a wide grin that flashed her white teeth against her ebon skin.

"So what do we do now?" Sheila asked. "Are we going to be hunting down Kane down and trying to do damage control so we make sure we are still born?"

That sent a chill up the backs of the demigods, even over the breeze of the Hawaiian morning.

"We hunt him down. Even if he changes things, we can't leave him to keep changing things." Janeka was deadly serious at this point, not a hint of her normal grin or smile.

With that, they moved down the beach. Out in the waters, the US Navy destroyers were under power now as their sailors scanned the waters for enemies. The band ignored the painted wooden signs that stated this was a US military base as they came up to the inlet. Explosions, engines, guns and shouts filled the air with an almost shaking presence off half a mile away. They saw a ship headed towards them, belching smoke and fury into the air as Zeroes screamed by.

"First wave," Sheila muttered to herself. The water shook as bombs rained down from bombing runs against the battleships. "At least the aircraft carriers are not here."

The airfield on the main shore of the island was being pounded as American airplanes burned on the ground. The band of six young looking teens moved up the main outlet, following the flow of the sailors and soldiers.

"The TV did not do justice to the wars of this future," Voreth complained as a Zero screamed by overhead. "It is much louder and more violent than I had imagined."

The heavy thudding of the anti-aircraft guns finally started up, taking futile shots at the departing Zeroes. Soldiers continued to shout as they ran around frantically trying to put out fires.

"What the hell are you doing bringing a kid onto base?" a rough hewn man with a blond crew cut shouted at them. His eyes narrowed at Tsukyo and Voreth.

"We were already here as the attack started, sergeant," Dana said smoothly. Her dulcet tones cut through the chaos to calm him down. "We just want to help."

"I've got first aid training," Sheila called out helpfully.

"Fine! Come on, you yahoos. We got work to do," the sergeant called out.

Dana pulled out her little Atlantean statue they had found so long ago. She was not the best healer, but she could do her utmost. Dolph nodded as he pulled out the little Chinese amulet on a leather cord. He only felt the tiniest of a guilty conscience from stealing it from a museum.

But they all chipped in to do their best after the first wave of the attack. Billowing, black smoke rose into the air, giving the tropical paradise a truly hellish cast. The screams and groans would have fit into Dante's Inferno.

The second wave of fighters came in on schedule, seemingly too quick. Resistance from the sailors, marines and the army started to stiffen. Sporadic anti-aircraft fire became more steady, even as more bombs rained down on the ships and airfield. More orders were screamed as officers tried to get some of his planes into the air to interdict them.

Sailors and soldiers found it odd that the civilian dressed group functioned as an odd little unit or team. Somehow they managed to keep people alive, men that they had sworn were more mangled meat than people.

Things started to slow down after the second wave. Those that had studied this battle in depth breathed a sigh of relief. Janeka had studied copied books at her grandparents, Sheila had exhaustively been tutored while Dolph had picked up more from his World History class than he could have imagined.

So the warning from the RADAR station about another wave was electrifying for the band. Janeka overhead it from new orders being shouted out from a runner heading to the anti-aircraft guns.

"There wasn't a third wave," Janeka muttered to herself as she thought furiously.

"Kane. He must have managed to get to the Japanese fleet to convince them and is trying to hit a knockout blow," Sheila mused aloud to the group. "I would head toward the petroleum bunkers."

"What the hell are you talking about?" Sergeant Reyers demanded.

"Saving more lives," Sheila suddenly said. "Tsukyo?" The winds swirled around her as the dust and burnt grass were picked up as she floated into the air.

"Right!" he responded as his own winds picked him off the ground.

With a woosh, they rocketed into the air and to the east towards the tanks of fuel tanks.

"Dolph! We need to get some fighter airplanes in the air as soon as possible. I'm going to do ground fire support for Sheila and Tsukyo," Janeka called out, charging over to a burning wreck of an Mustang. With a flicker, she flashed away through the flames.

Sergeant Reyers' mouth had just dropped open in shock, even as the vaguely Polynesian woman followed the black girl to flicker away through the fire.

"Sure, leave me to do the heavy lifting." Dolph crouched and then leaped into the air, the strength of his legs shaking the ground.

Dana had dashed to a nearby shadow and flickered through it to appear in the shadows of one of the supply building of the submarine pens.

The Aesir landed in the center of the main airfield. His hands crunched into the ground and then, as if he were using his massive shoulders directly, flexed the ground more perfectly flat than it had been before the attack. At twist of his limbs created giant stone hands to gently brush the remaining four burning planes off the runway.

The daughter of Artemis found and shadow-teleported to the undercarriage of a dive bomber, gripping the support strut in the shadows under the plane. Her hands were more than strong enough to grip into the plane and climb up the side of the Zero fighter.

The Japanese pilot looked over as the masked, shadowy figure and away from the green island he was approaching just in time to see her lash out with her silver sickle to end his life.

Down on the ground, Janeka was summoning her huge powered armor with its shoulder mounted concussion cannon. She hopped into the fifteen foot bipedal vehicle and started to track the oncoming Zeroes. "Take this, mother-%& *%," she shouted out. With a loud boom, she sent a burst of energy flying into the air.

The poorly armored Zero took the hit right through the bomb, causing fratricide with his right wingman as it exploded with amazing force.

The scion of Raiden, Motoki Kamayaka, frowned as the Americans were responding far more quickly than he expected. He would have to deal with that woman with the silvery blade in single combat. He flipped open his Zero's cockpit, sliding back the canopy. He was just looking over his shoulder when he saw two of the dive bombers in the center of the formation suddenly dropped out of formation, sprays of blood decorating the inside of the glass. "What? Another attacker?"

Sheila rolled over and sped up to catch up to the next pair of fighters. Normally, she would not have just killed the hapless human pilots, but just wounding them could leave them capable of continuing on with the mission or even sacrificing themselves in a kamikaze attack. And the whole Pacific theater of war could be catastrophically changed by the bombing of that fuel depot. She judged the angle for her next two shots with inhuman keenness, firing her pistol once for each pilot and murdered them with sickening ease.

Dana stepped out of the shadow on the left side of her next Zero target, shoving her hand through the glass canopy to decapitate its pilot with her sickle, disappearing into the shadow again to appear on the next target in a blur the next second.

"Die!" Motoki shouted as he called down the fury of his father upon the shadowy attacker, brandishing his father's arrow. Blue-white energy slammed down from the oily clouds in the sky and struck the black garbed daughter of Artemis, sending her falling through the air in a trail of fire.

"Dana!" Tsukyo shouted as he flew up. He raise up a hand and with blast of wind, snapped out the wind and arrested her fall. With a swish, he swooped in and caught the slightly older woman.

"More infidels!" the scion of Raiden roared as he leaped into the air. "Itomi! Show your purity of swordcraft. To me!" The feather attached to the hilt of the katana that Raiden had gifted him with glowed with the power of a lightning bolt.

With a swirl of feathers, a massive red-faced tengu appeared. He was carrying a massive katana that was twelve feet long. Instantly spotting the younger Amatsukami carrying a wounded companion, he folded his wings and dove like a hawk. The chiseled point of his sword out to skewer his foe.

Tsukyo looped around, the katana coming far too close to his left eye for comfort. "Whoa!"

The tengu just smiled as his wings allowed him to turn tightly to follow the demigods.

The scion of Raiden turned his attention back to the attackers from the ground. Bolts of energy or random debris were shattering the formation of the remaining planes. But those could sometimes survive, but the lanky figure shooting his men in the head was not something. "Let the divine storm scour you from the sky," the demigod shouted again.

A massive bolt of lightning shot from the nearest cloud at the lanky figure. So when the girl caught the lightning bolt and then tossed it through the canopy of another zero, Motoki could only gape in surprise

"You are kind of a blowhard, aren't you?" Sheila called out perfectly clear in Japanese. "Of course, you attack from weakness. Do you see the coward's knot well?"

Motoki roared in fury as she insulted his honor and bravery. He ignored everything as his vision tunneled to only focus on her. Sheila dove and twisted. At the last moment, she turned upward acutely, causing Motoki to blindly turn to follow.

He and one of his men's Zeroes slammed into each other. The fighter exploded even as it knocked him silly. With only a look over her shoulder, she shot off to intercept the formation of fighters that had mostly pulled away from her.

Down below, Janeka snarled inside of her huge power armor. This was taking far, far too long. The petite, young demigoddess drew deeply upon her legend to impose her will upon the Fate of Pearl Harbor. Shouting sailors, marines and army soldiers pointed at as where there had been one there was now nine powered armor 'robots' all firing rapidly at the Zeroes that were starting their dives.

General Short and his attaches hopped out of his jeep to stare into the smoke-stained sky as pulses of energy and flickering forms in the sky hammered into the Zeroes. Anti-aircraft guns, manned by incredibly tired soldiers shouted and roared defiance into the sky with the booms and thuds of their weapons.

"Keep firing until your weapons overheat!" the general shouted. "Don't let a single plane through-"

That when a nearly ten foot tall Dolph landed next to his parked jeep. "scuse me," he called out with his thick New York accent. The demigod snatched the jeep off the ground like it weighed as little as a baseball. He spun around twice to build up momentum over their heads and then threw it like some over-sized and demented discus.

The jeep smashed off of two Zeroes and narrowly missed a third as it smashed through the air.

"Booyaa! Score!" Dolph shouted as he pumped a fist. He still had that perfect touch for throwing from football.

Voreth appeared out of the fire of one of the burning Zeroes. Her superhumanly strong fingers grabbed the flimsy armor of the fighter and then with her other hand, directed jets of fire into the next plane over like some sort of supernatural flame thrower. The screams of the pilots could be faintly heard over the Mitsubishi engine.

The Atlantean let the flames take her in as she moved over to the next Zero.

Motoki caught himself before he could plow into the island hillside. He wiped the blood away from his lip, grimacing at the pain of his shoulder. That wisp of a female would pay for this indignity-

Ichor blazed through Sheila's body as she planted herself in front of the formation of fighter planes as the continued on to the south-west towards Pearl Harbor on a direct course for the Fuel Depot and the submarine pens. A terrible menace seemed to grow, making the hearts of the pilots cringe away.

The black, smoky clouds behind Sheila started to twist and spiral to a point right behind her. With a small, theatrical twist, it formed into a huge gigantic form of a warrior with an axe and shield. Sheila raised her right hand and then brought it down, controlling the giant made of smoke and vapor to have it slowly swing its axe.

It could not hurt a fly but it looked terribly imposing and it shattered the formation as each of the Japanese pilots panicked and split up.

"Sneaky girl. I like it." Janeka and her duplicates all said as they continued firing at the Zeroes that were breaking and scattering into the air.

Motoki seethed as he let his ichor heal the worst of his wounds as he flew back from the giant. He had to retreat. This attack was failing worse than Admiral Nagumo's worst nightmare. He flew over to one of the Zeroes and signaled with Raiden's arrow to retreat.

General Short just stared at the mile tall figure slowly 'swatting' at the fighters. "How the hell do I report that?"

"Eh, I don't sweat the small stuff," Dolph said as he grinned down at the battered men that were ever so much shorter than he was. "Report that we threw back a third wave with minimal casualties." He stretched and then shrank back down to his merely imposing height of six foot eleven.

"And what is the 'not small stuff'?" the general demanded. That boy had muscles in places most of his soldiers and marines didn't even have.

"The old gods are interfering with this war. This is one of the most important wars of the 20th century," the big Aesir said seriously.

A figure flashed by overhead, leaving a jet stream of displaced air.

"Now where is she going in such a big hurry?" Dolph asked as he noted that Dana and Tsukyo were headed towards him and Janeka. She had reverted to just one power armored giant that was tromping over to him. They bumped fists like some parody of football players in the future.

* * *

><p>Admiral Chuichi Nagumo was on the flight deck of the aircraft carrier Akagi, the pride and joy of his task force. "Lt. Motoki Kamayaka, how did you come back when your entire flight did not? Was it your divine blood that allowed this?"<p>

As his side, the glowering Kane Taoka was busy keeping an eye on the horizon. He felt slightly exposed here. "It was a simple, vital strike that would change the whole direction of the war," he explained stiffly. "My mother Amaterasu will be livid in the fact you can not handle a simple operation." Kane smiled a terribly nasty sneer as he looked at Japanese admiral. She would hate that he used her name to get what he wanted.

Nagumo stiffened. "I told you that attacking while they were more prepared would cause very severe losses. You also failed to let me know that the infidels had their own children of the gods." The men behind him only stiffened slightly in outrage at the accusation.

"I figured that if they did not interfere with the first attacks, they had departed," the half-American lied smoothly. "Still, all in all it is a pity. We shall have to work doubly hard-"

The two ton shell from the USS Arizona smashed through the light armor of the flight deck to hit the magazine with incredible accuracy. The shell exploded even as the sonic boom caught up, as it had been traveling faster than the speed of sound as it was guided down from thirty miles up.

The carrier bucked like a god had kicked the keel as explosions and fire spread catastrophically.

"Where are the planes? Have the Americans invented invisible planes and bombs?" a junior officer screamed as he looked around.

"How? How can they do this, Kane-sama?" Motoki snarled out, his visage turning as dark as his mood.

"I don't know yet. They aren't powerful enough to do this on their own," the traitor of the gods called back as the bedlam rose in crescendo. Sailors and pilots ran to and fro, trying to put the fires. The whole deck listed as another battery exploded below the flat top.

The carrier Kagi only a half mile to the starboard and aft had a massive explosion shake it as another two ton shell punctured it through its weak flat top where it had little armor. It continued on for just another few seconds and then with a suddenness that was shocking, blew up into two parts.

Nagumo took off at an unseemly rush to the command station. "Get some pilots in the air. Find these attackers. Kill them!" he yelled out.

It took fifteen to get the first flight back up into the air while the admiral yelled at the recently landed patrol.

"What do you mean there was no one there?" Nagumo demanded in a cold fury. "My ships do not just explode on their own!" He was standing in front of the windows of the bridge as sirens wailed and the sounds of shouting men could be heard dimly.

Sheila's third two ton shell from the Arizona slammed home at over MACH 2, hitting a seam between two pieces of armor to strike home into the fore weapon magazine. The Akagi bucked again, lifting up thirty feet in the water before landing hard back in the water. With a groaning wrench, the keel bent and then snapped and hundreds of tons of metal and waters swept away the poor Japanese sailors and pilots.

Rear Admiral Chuichi Nagumo did not survive his command as it sank in less than ten minutes from the lethal attack. Kane and Motoki quickly vacated the ship, both demigods plotting angry revenge with every passing mile as they retreated to Japan.

* * *

><p>"What's taking her so long?" Tsukyo complained as he eyed the six US soldiers that had their rifles pointed at him due to being visibly half-Japanese. They were outside in the smoky gloom on Ford Island<p>

"They are over a hundred miles out. It takes a while to pick up shells and then slam them home to sink carriers," Janeka said. Cruise missiles would not fit in her power armor, but she was suddenly thinking about the viability of indirect energy weapons. It would not be that hard to figure out.

Dana looked over across the island to the north. "There she is."

Sheila appeared to slap onto the hard concrete with a soft tap-tap and immediately started dancing around. "Yeah! Two carriers! Then I sank a destroyer with my last shell!"

All of the soldiers looked at her as if she were totally nuts.

"You used four shells to sink three ships? Damn, kid. Good hunting," Dolph said before he gave out a low whistle.

"How old are you, kid?" the sergeant asked suspiciously.

"I just turned twelve." Sheila blinked for just a second as she calculated the number of days. "In fact, today's my birthday."

Everyone else in the band looked at her oddly.

Sgt. Collin Black just gave her a shocked look. "Well, I think we better scare up a cake for her birthday. What do you yahoos think?"

"Sounds like a great idea, sarge." That was the best news they had heard all day after the third attack had been decimated.

"Black? What is going on?" Colonel Myers demanded as he opened the door for the general.

"Miss Henderson says she sank two carriers and one destroyer with the shells she borrowed," the very Caucasian Sgt. Black said to his superior officer. "We were offering her a birthday cake in celebration."

Myers blinked and then looked over at the girl that was bouncing on her toes with a big smile. "If she did that, I'll chip in for her cake." He jerked his head. "Okay, all of you inside. The admiral wants to talk to you."

The inside of the main building was not immune to the chaos of the attack. A secretary at the front desk nodded to the colonel as she kept typing up a storm. The officer led them back through a door and several more secretaries that all barely glanced up as they continued with their frenetic paperwork.

The somber and haggard looking Admiral Kimmel looked like he had aged ten year just on the bad news of the attack. At his side was the solid looking General Short.

"These are the folk that helped us? And all civilians?" the admiral asked Myers.

"Yes, sir."

Kimmel frowned as he rubbed his thickening jaw. "I saw the impossible twice in one day. The reporters from Honolulu are going nuts, demanding to know what sort of demon we summoned to drive off the Japs."

Sheila coughed delicately. "It was just a cloud I made look like that. I bluffed."

"You are saying that it was just a cloud that happened to look like a warrior with an axe and a shield? That it could not have done anything except look scary? And that it managed to drive off the Japs?" Kimmel asked very carefully.

The youngest scion shrugged. "It was a deception to allow the rest of the defenses to keep them from hitting the fuel depot. They might have sunk all of your battleships, but losing all that fuel would have set things back at least two years." She gave a curt nod.

Kimmel smiled thinly, which for him was as good as outrageous laughter. "So who are you folks? I can't find anyone that saw you before today on base."

"We just arrived this morning from an unexpected trip." Janeka frowned cutely as she thought quickly. "Don't mean to upset you or your beliefs, but we are classic heroes."

"Classic heroes?" Myers asked, looking confused over to them and then to his commanding officers.

"Hercules? Jason and the Argonauts? Classicly children of the gods heroes," Sheila said a bit bluntly, causing Dana, Janeka and even Dolph to wince.

Kimmel's nostrils flared as he took a deep breath even as Myers mouth dropped open and his eyes bulged almost comically.

"Really."

"You want me to go send Dolph out to juggle tanks to prove he's as strong as Hercules was?" Janeka asked with an arched eyebrow.

"A better question is, are you Americans? And are you loyal?" Myers demanded, causing Kimmel to stiffen his back in surprise. The younger officer, being a real firebrand looked ready to start a fist fight.

"I'm from Manhattan," Dolph said as he glared down at the officer as if he was going to rip his head off. "Born and raised."

"Not the best part of town, either," the general noted, his own Eastern seaboard accent showing through.

"From Harlem myself," Janeka said. Short and Kimmel seemed to ignore her totally, but she clamped down on her anger. She was just as good as anyone else. Better, even.

"Upstate New Jersey," Tsukyo said with a jaunty thumb's up.

That got him a glare from all of the officers.

"Son, I understand that you are just trying to help, but being even half Jap is liable to get you lynched by my men," Short said while giving the young man a flat look.

"Only Voreth is not a citizen of the United States," Dana explained with carefully, giving special care to the way she said it so that they would calm down the officers.

"Demigods... Well, what can you do to help? And why didn't you do more during the first attack?" General Short demanded, biting off each word angrily.

"We didn't want to mess with our future if we could help it," Janeka replied. "We're from the future, you see."

"Demigods. From the future." Kimmel looked almost punch-drunk from all the information that was being dumped on him.

"Real cool science fiction stuff. Wireless phones. Cameras that fit in your pocket," Janeka said as she carefully pulled out her smartphone. Thank god it was an iPhone and not a Samsung or Sanyo.

They all blinked at the odd device. It took a few minutes of playing with it for each of them (and Janeka showing them a few of her historical movies) for them to realize that it was far beyond anything that could be currently made.

"I can almost understand not wanting to mess with the future, but that's already happened. Now what can you do to help?"

"We only have a few weeks to get ready, but we need to raise as many battleships as we can," Janeka said. "And you, Dolph, are going to be key."

The big blond Aesir blinked, then narrowed his eyes. It only took a moment for his keen mind to catch up to his genius fiancee's plan. "Ice. Right. I can float all the ships off the harbor bay up in just minutes. And with a few of us, I bet we can drag them over to the repair docks."

Kimmel blinked for a long couple of moments. "You can do that?" He was suddenly seeing his career being potentially saved.

"We can do more than that. We just need to make sure that we still counter attack as quickly as we can." Sheila's blue-green eyes were cold and furious as she juggled numbers and dates in her head.

* * *

><p>The Enterprise dropped into the next swell ever so slightly, plowing through the Pacific waters at a steady pace. It was just a few weeks since the attack on Pearl Harbor and quite a bit had changed. The United States had fully entered the war even as the different Axis powers had counter-declared war against them. But this was their first counter attack in the Pacific.<p>

Sheila looked over the edge of the deck towards the nearest battleship. It was the USS West Virginia, recently raised from the floor of Pearl Harbor. All in all, only the battleship Arizona had been left at Pearl Harbor. It was just too damaged to repair (but not scavenge from), but Dolph, Tsukyo, Sheila and Dana had actually drug it into a dry dock so that the grisly business of recovering the dead could be done. Then it would be torn apart for scrap.

Then everyone but Tsukyo swarmed over the battleship West Virginia first in its drydock scaffold. Sheila finally picked up Janeka's trick to make a virtual army of co-located clones. A tarp roof was set up and then, out of the sight of any spies flying over head, the battleship was repaired in seeming moments.

Inside, the five of the Band of Artificers worked in a time compression zone, cramming weeks of work into only an hour. Dorathi came out and with his mastery of fire and ancient Atlantean sciences, chipped in with his significant strength. Dana was more than happy to chip in, even though her specialty was crafting small relics. Sheila was more generalist and had quite a bit of engineering to fall back on. Janeka and Dolph were quite happy and dug in. The daughter of Ares even got to use her squad of robots to assist with the repair, so the air was filled with 'roger-roger' that even some of the normal engineers picked up on.

But now it was out into the gloomy February of the North Pacific with the rebuilt PAC Fleet. A light rain was falling from the gray sky, making the flat top of the Enterprise a bit slick. The sailors on deck watched Sheila closely, worried that she would blow off in the wind.

A little bit of wind blew in some raindrops into the passageway. Two sailor ducked out of her way as she headed down the narrow stairs that was almost a ladder. She waved to the marines outside the admiral's quarters. One of them quite politely opened the door for her, his blue eyes studying her with only a hint of hostility.

The somber Husband Kimmel looked up from his papers. "Miss Henderson, could you summon your companions? I'm afraid something serious has come up."

The young girl blinked. "Sure." She tapped a small earbud in her ear. "Hey guys. Admiral Kimmel wishes to talk to us ASAP." She tapped it again to turn off the send feature. "They'll be here-"

One of the marines rapped on the door and immediately opened it for Janeka and Tsukyo.

"Ha! Beat you," the eternal sixteen year old Amatsukami said excitedly as he squirmed through the hatch.

The admiral looked pained at the antics, but held his reaction to just the expression. Soon the last three demigods arrived and he stood up. "Thank you for your promptness. I have some serious news and as my mythic specialists, I felt it best to inform you. President Roosevelt was attacked last night and was seriously injured by what can only be described as shadowy Japanese warriors."

"Kane attacked the President with ninja? You have got to be kidding me. That's as subtle as a turd in a punch bowl," Janeka exclaimed while slapping a hand to her forehead.

Kimmel just stared at her, then frowned. "This Kane is normally subtle? Setting up a third attack on Pearl Harbor is not exactly subtle to me."

Janeka shared a look with Dana. "Thing is, from our time, he was pretty much a ghost. We only saw him twice. Both times he booked... uh, ran off without even fighting us directly. We actually tried to track him down on our own, but the man is a ghost. Only thing we found is that he's involved in some very shady things in the mortal world. He's pretty much the antithesis of his mother."

Dana nodded after a long moment of thought. "Give me a moment to check a thought of mine." With that the mystic pulled out her little bag of finger bones. The storm and ship noises seemed to mute even as the shadows deepened. The clatter as they rolled across the maps of the Pacific on Kimmel's desk. Her dark brown (nearly black) eyes studied the bones as if they carried the secrets of the world. "It was a distraction. If your subtle foe is suddenly obvious, look for the knife in the back. Admiral, I'd suggest that you send out a priority alert to all stations to look for spies or saboteurs." She bit down lightly on her lower lip as she tried to think.

"It has to be in the United States," Sheila said as she thought. "It's the only reason to do the attack there."

"I can't think of a reason though," Janeka grumbled aloud.

"We'll let the brass back home worry about that. We have our own battles to worry about here."

They all nodded at that. They had been helping hugely with preparing the US Navy with destroying the Japanese Imperial Navy.

* * *

><p>Admiral Yamamoto had engaged the US Navy early in the day, but had quickly declined to stay engaged. Planes, bombs and shells had flown between their fleets off the shores of the Philippines. Both sides had struck hard and sank several destroyers. Each had scored hits on the other's aircraft carriers, but that damage had been 'minimal' with only a dozen casualties.<p>

But for now, Japan had been forced from their assault to take the Philippines and American troops were landing to route the Japanese army.

Janeka and Sheila had set up a highly advanced 3D holographic radar control station which the US admirals had used to ruthless effect, allowing the US to stage mid-air ambushes on their attacks.

"Guys, I think that there is a supernatural attack under way," Dana called out as she pointed away from the fleet engagement and towards an island to the northeast.

"The hell?" Janeka complained. "I don't think it's an illusion. It's showing up on radar."

"We're being attacked with an island?" Dolph asked. He seemed boggled by the concept as he well understood the strength required to move things. Islands should not possible to move! Of course, he regularly did the impossible himself...

"It's got a wake. Is something pushing it?" Tsukyo asked

"Tsukyo! Sheila! We need to know what we are facing," the daughter of Ares called out. "We need to come about to directly south and go to full emergency power before we are ran aground."

The two youngest and faster members of the band shot off into the air.

"I'm going left, Tsukyo! You go right," Sheila called out.

What was revealed as they came around the small island was a gigantic man with a Japanese topknot. He was up to his chest and pushing with huge hands to move the island. His face was quite red from effort and if the rest of his body matched his size, he would easily be over three hundred feet tall.

"Take that!" the young half-Japanese American shouted as he sent a huge wave of water to slam into the giant's face. "Ha!"

The giant blinked stupidly even as he turned his face towards Tsukyo. Beady dark eyes were almost lost underneath his incredibly bushy eyebrows. His voice was so low it seemed almost like the rumble of an earthquake. "Traitor. Amaterasu promise Daidara-bocchi freedom by bring back evil scion of the Amatsukami!" The giant's ancient Japanese was almost impossible to decipher, which confused poor Tsukyo.

"What?" the young teen asked in confusion even as he made another wave to strike at the Japanese giant.

"Stop!" Daidara-bocchi shouted as he slapped his hands together.

The water below Tsukyo exploded out of the way of clear blue crystals. With a boom, they slammed together to form one piece, trapping him like a fly in amber.

Sheila just gaped in shock, as she had never seen one of her band taken out so easily. She narrowed her eyes angrily even as she toggled her quantum-entangled radio. "Tsukyo is captured. It's Daidara-bocchi." She zipped up behind the giant and then made a bolt of lightning strike from the sky above Tsukyo to blast down upon the giant's head.

"Huh? You trapped!" the giant shouted angrily. "You no do anything any more!" He strode out of the hole he had been in to push the island from. Muddy seawater sloughed off as he towered over the island.

Back on the bridge of the Enterprise, one of the seamen shouted out. "I see him. Lord above, he's taller than a battleship."

"I'm going to free Tsukyo," Dolph shouted as he charged out the hatch and onto the gantry. The giant Aesir crouched down and then unleashed all the power of his body in a great leap. His push caused the massive aircraft carrier to shake.

The battleship West Virginia's gunnery crew had been tracking the island, not realizing that it was actually moving. So when they saw the giant standing behind the island, the gunnery officer earned a promotion by making a snap decision.

"Fire at that giant!" Sgt. Michael Charles Busham shouted.

22 inch cannons fired in a thunderous cascade of violence. Daidara-bocchi was a huge target, but quite capable of dodging. So he was only hit by the blast effect of three rounds, singing his skin. They corrected their targeting and fired again.

This time they got two direct hits, doing more than singing his skin. The giant roared over the explosions, forming a rock armor over his body.

"Sheesh, Tsukyo," Dolph said as he waded through the six foot waters that were being churned up by the giant and shelling. Incredibly strong finger grabbed the perfect crystal and flexed. For a moment, nothing happened and then with an amazingly loud crash of glass, the crystal shattered.

Tsukyo looked around as everything seemed to shift on him. "Hey, what happened?"

Daidara-bocchi roared in anger as he picked up a boulder larger than some houses, lobbing it at the West Virginia, just missing the hull and causing a huge splash. Lightning struck from the sky as Sheila threw a powerful lightning bolt that scorched the giant's shoulder.

"Waterspout?" Janeka noted as she looked off to the north where a mass of black clouds was hoving into view over the horizon. She tapped her earbud receiver. "Sheila, intercept that thing before it hits something important."

The winds around the youngest demigoddess focused and sped up shooting her off at a speed faster than sound itself inches above the swell of the sea. She did not care that she was leaving sprays of water hundreds of feet tall behind her.

The scion of Raiden, Motoki Kamayaka, had his teeth bared as he struggled to control the tornado he had unleashed. It would soon disperse, as it turned into a thing of water when it touched the ocean. But for a short time, he had a powerful weapon to use to destroy the American carriers. He knew this war would only be won with air power; The Holy Wind would protect his home as it always did!

The crew of the CVN Enterprise shouted in alarm as the ten meter wide sea twister roared down upon them. It started to tear apart the front of the carrier with metal-rending force. Motoki snarled in glee as he saw their terror, only to blink in surprise as a blur snatched something off the deck.

Sheila's corded muscles strained with the weight of the one thousand pound bomb, flying almost straight up to drop the bomb into the middle of the swirling vortex of water.

"Stupid little girl, you have to arm a bomb. You know nothing of the matters of war," Motoki called out in scorn.

The young scion of Athena returned his glare from over three hundred feet. "Of course I know that. I'm a demigoddess of war. Lightning is a great trigger."

The Japanese demigod blinked even as two bolts of lightning came from each hand. One struck the water spout, instantly vaporizing a hole that the second lightning bolt used to invade the waterspout. The massive bomb exploded, fatally 'killing' the waterborn twister.

"You! Girl!" Motoki shouted out as he lifted up Raiden's Arrow and pointed the katana at her. In his off hand he held his service pistol. "How dare you forestall the will of the gods with your blasphemy!"

"And you are an posturing idiot. We're both demigods. Baka yaro!" Sheila countered even as she drew Hadecleus from its shadowspace and clicked the safety of Athena's Wit in her other hand.

"Fuck that shit," Janeka shouted as she summoned her super-heavy power armor while leaping from the bridge. Her metal-clad form skidded across the flat top of the CVN-65 Enterprise in a spray of sparks, perfectly missing the three scattered Wildcat fighters and the yelling crew and pilots.

Several marines were firing their rifles and one machine gun at the figure in the sky, but he was a flickering, dodging blur that was impossible to hit.

Voreth skidded out of a hatch while brandishing her rings as she chanted a spell. Nothing visible happened. But then, most curses were subtle things.

The cannon on Janeka's power armor rotated up and then sighted the figure in the air. Ionized plasma lanced out at the flickering Japanese demigod as he dodged. "Homing, explosion beam. Yippee-ki-yay, mother fucker!" The beam bent impossibly in curves, tracking the shocked Japanese hero.

Motoki was shot sideways from the explosion, trailing smoke as he desperately held onto his sword. "Sorcery-" His complaint was cut off as pain impinged upon him. Looked down, he took in the black metal of Hadecleus under his sternum. His dark eyes met her blue-green ones below him.

The youngest demigoddess held his gaze as blood trickled out his mouth; his eyes glazing over as life fled. She tried not to feel any sadness as she reached up and pulled him off the tip of her sword.

The yells from down below were turning frantic.

"Most of the prow is missing," a frantic damage control officer shouted. "We're taking on too much water."

"Ah, fuck," Janeka swore loudly. Her power armor was not able to swim. Or even float.

"We will have to abandon ship," the statuesque Atlantean said as she scowled at the prow of the aircraft carrier.

That was when Dana flickered out of a shadow, picked up the 15' tall power armor by its left leg and stepped back into the shadow of the command tower. Only a few heartbeats later, Dana reappeared with Dolph in tow right back out of the shadow.

"What the hell-!?" the big blonde Aesir called out. "Oh."

The Enterprise's deck was tilting forward as the metal groaned. The flat surface of the runway was starting to bend and buckle.

Dolph took a big breath and then charged down the slope even as he reached for the earth two hundred feet below the waterline. A massive pillar of stone shot from the floor of the Pacific, stopping the sinking of the carrier for at least a few minutes. He swatted two planes away from him as slid across the deck, showing a bit of inhuman agility. He suddenly grinned. This was going to be a great challenge of his strength and power.

He went off the edge. Just above the water, he reached out and casually plunged his hands into the steel armor like it was butter. His toes just splashed into the water. Ichor exploded in power within his veins.

And cold exploded from his very essence, instantly covering him and everything with over a hundred feet in frost as the temperature went from about one hundred degrees to zero celsius.

"There we go. Just stay afloat for a minute or two and I'll have your metal hide back together," he said to the inanimate ship.

Back on the island, Janeka was feeling a bit like a flea. "I'm in a giant robot and I feel like an ant. There ain't no fucking justice. Someone is jerking my damn chain around," she shouted in complaint. Servos whined in complaint as they leaped her out of the way of fists the size of houses that pulverized whole sections of the beach of the island.

Tsukyo decided to try to duplicate Sheila's trick with molding clouds into a gigantic form of his own father Susano-O. "This should send the idiot running."

Daidara-bocchi was a bit more brave than that, though. He slapped his hands down hard upon the Pacific Ocean, sending a wave of water towards the feet of the faux-Susano-O. The thirty foot wave washed away the cloud-sculpture's feet.

The giant started laughing. "Just a cloud! You must think Daidara-bocchi dumb!"

Tsukyo grinned at him. "No. I thought it was a great distraction so Janeka could kill you." He just laughed and shot off into the sky, twisting into a vertical barrel roll.

The giant's top-knot actually twitched as he looked back to the beach of the island he had been moving.

There was a curved line of nine power armors, plasma cannons humming ominously. Janeka had duplicated herself into a literal Army of One. "Eat more dakka, asswipe," they called out.

The scream of accelerated, energized particles was deafening as they targeted the three hundred foot tall giant. His flesh boiled as the tightly focused beams struck home in a cascade of death.

"Ew. I barbequed him. That's much more gross in real life." The nine Janeka's then turned and ran off at high speed to get back to the other side of the island. And the fight!

Sheila had laid the dead body of Motoki on the listing deck of the Enterprise. The young girl then raised her hands to the clouds far off to the south. Her own ichor burned in her veins, almost making her glow as she forced her power over the sky to actually create a real object by exerting her will upon them. A chain of huge hollow, metal spheres on cables swirled into existence as the clouds streamed across the sky. "Tie them down as flotation devices!" she shouted to the sailors. She literally started glow with a soft, blue-white radiance as she used her own mastery of war to make her her own 'Army of One'.

All of her and the US Navy sailors quickly had the flotation spheres tied down on the ruined prow even as the temperature slowly dropped even more under Dolph's command. A crackling heralded the spread of ice, radiating from him. Ice coated the Prince of Hel as he pulled himself out of the sheet of ice he was creating, his hair turning feathery and snow-white as his form started to shed away in flakes of snow and ice. Ice spread out as a flat iceberg that easily held the Enterprise from a watery doom.

Fate settled into the very metal of the proud aircraft carrier Enterprise and its crew as the lines of destiny that bound the Band of Artificers together resonated. Legend, Fate and Destiny all were drawn to this moment off the coast of the Philippines. Their bonds of Fate held them and bolstered their Legend, causing something miraculous to occur.

"What the fuck?" Janeka asked as she noted the glow off the helmet instruments as the remnants of her physical, mortal form burned away. The power armors stopped and then tumbled forward empty of their pilots.

Tsukyo felt his own mortal form burning away in wisps and streams of foggy condensation. He held up his hands to watch in fascination as he sublimely sublimated away without a hint of pain.

"Miss? Are you supposed to be glowing?" one of the sailors asked as he watched the multiple glowing girls fading away as the last knot was tied.

"Yes. I actually think I am." The young teen stared at her fingers in fascination as they started to fade away. "So this is apotheosis..."

With a crack of thunder, the demigods all disappeared.

Moment's later their forms reappeared on the stable deck of the Enterprise. No longer limited to just a human appearance, their visage was of epic and startling grandeur.

Dolph's skin had become of pale and perfect while his hair was now snow and frost that cascaded down to his shoulders. His massive and heroically muscled form was covered in his sleeveless black leather armor. Cold blue eyes that were literally chiseled from ice looked on to the rest of the group as he leaned casually on his spear. He clenched one fist in front of him, looking as the rock flowed seamlessly like it was flesh and not harder than steel.

Janeka new silver eyes looked around, startling against her dark skin. For the most part she looked the same, though slightly 'prettified' in a new outfit. But what an outfit it was, as it seemed like something right out of a steampunk recreation. "Well, da-aum. Ain't that the schnitz?" Something felt slightly odd about her scalp, so she poked at it with her fingers only to find her dreadlock and cornrows seemed to be made of wiry metal hair.

The sixteen year old half-Japanese was wearing sleeveless karate gi and hakama of fine blue and blue-green silk, adorned with waves and lightning. The T-shirt underneath the top looked like it was clouds in motion, spinning turbulently to match his emotions. His features were literally eye-watering in a bishonen, tough guy look. "We succeeded?"

Dana nodded, though it was hard to see. She seemed more shadow than anything else, with only the hint of the haze of moonlight along the outer edges of her form. Of her own features you could only see her moonlit eyes, dark hair and the hissing of her ponytail snakes in their silver scaled adornments. Her syckle was wrapped around her waist as a chain.

Vorathi walked over to one of the few fighter planes still tied down to the tilted deck of the Enterprise. Her hand wiped the grime from a plane to take in her own changed appearance. Her eyes glowed with magical power and her hair glowed with the soft radiance of molten metal strands that slowly dripped to the ground with hot spatters. Her appearance was nearly as beautiful as Dolph and Tsukyo's were handsome. She did not seem at all happy.

The glowing strand of hair that Sheila examined was like super fine fiber optical cable. "Glowing hair and a black uniform with no markings. Welcome to divinity, I guess." The youngest goddess suddenly winced as she heard a soundless crack. Streams of red light were suddenly shining through what appeared to be fractures on the surface of her form. "What?" She grit her teeth in pain, dropping to one knee and bracing a hand flat on the ground.

"Shit, that's the marks from that broken mirror between worlds." Janeka's face was scrunched in sudden, deep thought. "Dolph, Dana; heal her again. Quick, before she loses it."

As the son of Hel and daughter of Artemis pulled out their purloined relics, Voreth started casting a spell. The insight of her Third Eye would be needed.

"Ways of the Unseen, Voices of the Unheard; release my senses of all mortal limits," the goddess of magic called out as she brandished her magic on the tip of her fingers. Her eyes started to strain as she took in the fractured existence. Pulses of Sheila's spirit and legend were trying to travel down the radiating lines that disappeared into other-wheres. "Her soul and spirit are trying to... escape? Out of this body."

"So what can we do? Healing her doesn't seem to be helping," the young half-Japanese boy said worriedly.

"She was fine as a demigod..." Janeka was thinking furiously. She moved over to the glowing-haired goddess. "Sheila, I need you to focus. Take on a form that is more mortal."

"G-Good idea," she replied through clenched teeth. She reached within her spirit and power, to lessen her presence upon the mortal world. It took a moment of metaphysical fumbling, but she was soon reducing her presence down to the level of merely an overwhelming demigoddess again. The glowing fractures in her physical form merely throbbed with burning power.

"Hold still, kiddo." Dolph had pulled out the Chinese relic of a fallen demigod (for the third Ming dynasty) and was using it again. He instantly washed away her near lethal wounds easily as his potent life force allowed such a thing easily.

Sheila still had her glowing strands of sunlight-hair and had her simple uniform, but was no longer greatly weighing upon the world. "Why did that happen to me and not you guys?" she asked in confusion.

"That's a damn good question. But it's all metaphysical and magic shit. So we should ask Dana and Voreth-"

"I am Vorathir: Goddess of Lost Atlantis now. But you speak truly; seek guidance, as I think this is a new thing. Perhaps, Daughter of Artemis, you may cast a prophecy upon her to let us know what we must do to overcome this," the new goddess of the ancient and forgotten realm of Atlantis said.

The shadowy figure nodded. Her mastery of Prophecy had grown along with her more obvious powers of Darkness, the Moon and Magic. The Goddess of Unrelenting Vengeance held back from twisting fate towards having one of the Band of Artificers. First she cast upon herself which of their party she should choose, suddenly getting a vision that surprised her. Then she reached deep within herself to alter the fabric of reality itself, imposing her will over Prophecy. "Know this, daughter of Athena, your Salvation does lie with the Last Goddess of Atlantis. Know this and prepare yourself, for you do not wish to lose this chance."

"What does that mean?" Sheila asked the new Atlantean goddess.

"I do not know. It appears that it is in my future yet. Let us speak to the admiral about what we must do now that we have few limits." Vorathir smiled a very rare smile to the young goddess of her band. She reached out and ruffled her glowing hair. "This too shall pass. Eventually."

Deep below in the waters of the Pacific, fate pulled upon them as the weight of five gods strode the world with no limits. The power of their Legend and presence awoke a powerful kraken of Typhonian proportions. The small underwater mountain shattered as the huge, five hundred foot long creature sensed immortal prey.

* * *

><p>The shadows in the corner of the drab office in Manhattan flickered for just a second before the Japanese man stepped out as easily as walking across the room. "Ah. General Groves." He was incredibly average looking, though his face hinted at cruelty that he did not bother to hide right now at this midnight hour.<p>

The thick jowled officer paled as he started and then stood up. "Kane Taoka. I hear that you seek to destroy the world-"

"Save it," the demigod traitor said. "I don't want to destroy the world. My reasons are far more personal. But you, General Groves, will not get to help create the most powerful mortal weapon ever." Shadows suddenly extended from his image on the wall, spearing through the helpless mortal before he could even take a step.

"We'll stop you," the soldier gasped out.

"No, you won't. You were the last one. Oppenheimer. Fermi. Einstein. I murdered them all tonight. America... is fucked." He leaned over to look into the glazing eyes of the dying general. "And the best part? This is just a distraction. I'm going to give the Nazi's everything they need to make the Atomic bomb. And they are going to win everything. It will probably only take a whisper from me into the right ear to get them to eventually take over all of Europe and the Americas. And then they will turn and crush Asia. And I will drag my mother from her palace and defile her after all of her gods and goddesses are dead." His dark eyes were glittering as he stared in Groves.

General Leslie Grove took his last, rasping breath and then spat in Kane's eyes.

"Goodbye, general. Die pitifully, far from any battles." And with that, Kane disappeared into a shadow.

With his life bleeding out and unable to breath, Grove marshalled his will and wrote with his own blood "Just distraction" in a messy sprawl upon the wall.

Then he died, a soft smile on his blood-stained lips under his trademark mustache. He would show that bastard that even a mortal could defy the gods.

* * *

><p>Kane stepped out of the shadows that were visible from the dusty windows of the local SS office in Berlin. "Ah, fraulein. Tea with honey. Is the Stormleader available?" the Japanese demigod asked in a flawless, Berlin German accent.<p>

The pretty blonde girl started from where she was doing her makeup. "Ah, of course Mr. Taoka-san. One moment." She very primly spun her chair and stood up on her tall heels. She walked over and knocked on the door. "Mr. Taoka-san is here for you, Klaus... Schmitt, sir," she belatedly said his last name like she had forgotten the formality for just a second.

Kane sauntered into the room behind her, looking quite suave and European in his turtleneck sweater and black slacks. "That is one very pretty girl you have for a secretary."

The blonde, blue-eyed son of Vidar just gave him a flat look. "We are not here to talk about my secretary, Mr. Taoka. Please, sit. And we will discuss the matter of this atomic bomb."

The future demigod smiled his plain face widely. "Of course. Of course." He flopped into the uncomfortable chair across the utilitarian wood desk that was piled high with papers. "You will be pleased to hear that I just finished removing the competition to your Fuehrer's grand plan. So now America is very much in a bad position while Germany is now in the forefront of the nuclear weapon programs. I'll go tomorrow and murder a couple of Englishmen that were involved. With you and the Aesir taking over the protection the Luena Plant near Marsburg. With you expanding that heavy water production, you should be able to make the more simple atomic bomb much earlier."

"You have Oppenheimer's notes?" Klaus asked with a crooked grin.

"Of course. I had to torture him for the combination to his safe and where he had his copies kept, but he gave it up before he ran out of fingers." Kane seemed affronted at the question.

"So you are willing to finally show this trump card that you says changes everything?" the younger (and far less powerful demigod) asked.

The traitor hid (barely) a snarl of frustration. He then smiled. "Certainly." He slid the short rod out of his sleeve. "Athena's Scepter of Unbending Time. What an interesting name." He set it on the desk in front of him, but kept his hand loosely on it.

"And this brought you here?" the poster-boy for the Nazi party asked in a cool tone.

"Not purposefully. At least yet. Stealing something from a goddess is no easy thing. And the power to traverse back in time is beyond mortal ken. Only a god can do that." The Japanese traitor smirked suddenly. "In fact, my first act will be to travel into the future and take the past self of one of my enemies to take as hostage. The black girl that just got into a relationship with the son of Hel. He actually cares for her." Kane just shook his head in bemusement.

Klaus just smiled thinly. It was the same smile he used when he dealt with the upper echelons of the Nazi party at functions. "Of course."

The secretary had finished heating the tea in the corner of the officer. She smiled winsomely at Kane and then quite seriously to Klaus. Her high heels caught on the throw rug but she managed to balance herself and her silver tray . The tea sloshed but did not quite spill as she bumped Kane's shoulder. "Sorry." She set the tray down.

Kane was scowling quite fiercely at the secretary as he reached out and picked up Athena's Scepter from under the edge of the tray.

She simpered as she poured his tea, stirring it with a spoon. Once she finished, she bowed and picked up the tray.

"How do you suffer her lack of intelligence?" Kane asked the moment the door closed.

"She has other very interesting attributes," the SS officer said in a very wry tone. The intercom suddenly buzzed.

"Sir, Herr Goering is demanding he talk to you. I tried to say-"

"Enough." Klaus shook his head theatrically. "The vagaries of command. I'll be right back."

The traitor to the gods nodded as he played with Athena's Scepter and placed it up his sleeve again. As the door clicked shut, he frowned.

How many spoons were on that tea set?

* * *

><p>The secretary tapped the door frame once as the spoon she held turned into Athena's Scepter. "How intriguing. Thank you, Klaus. You did an admirable job of keeping him distracted. I will be sure to let your father, Vidar, know of your cooperation."<p>

Klaus nodded. "What are we going to do with him? He's going to be furious that you stole the relic from him."

She smirked at him as she pushed off from the wall. "What you are going to do, dear Klaus, is to make sure that no one goes in there. I sort of remember how Ymir would freeze people in time. It was a long time ago." Her laughed changed as her form burned off in little flaming flakes of glowing ash.

Loki brushed off the remains of his illusion from his shoulder with his free hand while his other twirled the scepter so fast it was a shimmering disk.

The soldier looked confused at the closed door. "No one to go in there?"

"Not even you. Right now time is crawling along in that room and it will be months, if not years, before he notices that you are not coming back. Brick it up and then seal it in concrete. Kill the workers and get a new office. I'm going to go play with time." That upstart Japanese scion did have an interesting idea. Janeka White, hmm? Loki gave him a cocky grin as he saluted with the scepter and disappeared.

"God above us all, Loki with the power to travel through time. We're doomed," the Nazi grumbled to himself. He turned smartly on his heel of his brightly shined up boot and marched out the door to shout for a group of soldiers across the open field.

* * *

><p>Centrifuges hummed with power in the main processing area of the Luena Plant. Water dripped from the overhead pipes.<p>

Loki appeared, dragging a nine year old black girl behind him by one arm. She was beating on his back with her free hand and trying to kick him with her feet.

"My pa is gonna kick your ass," a very young Janeka shouted at the stranger. "Fire! Fire!"

"Will you shut up? Or I'll burn your mouth off," Loki snapped even as he conjured a ball of fire.

The young girl's brown eyes were incredibly wide in shock. "Is that fucking magic?"

"Child-"

BOOOOM!

A huge hole exploded in the thirty foot thick wall.

"Knock knock, gods are here," Tsukyo called out in a ribald manner.

Loki smirked again, even as he swept his free hand over the girl, hiding her behind a glamor of invisibility and inaudibility. He frowned as he took in their odd appearances. "Really? What do they teach children these days?" He said as he walked out of the shadows on a catwalk at the end of the facility. He had an almost lordly air about him.

"Grandfather. I wasn't expecting you here," Dolph called out. He stood head and shoulders above all of the rest of the band. "A lucky meeting."

"You have your mother's right eye. Or was it her left? Of course, I don't know you. I'm sure that Hel would have been quite pleased to have another pawn in her continual machinations against Odin. Or pretty much any of the Aesir. And then crow all about it the last time I visited her work at the new concentration camps," Loki explained in the fast pitter-patter of his natural trickster self.

"Yeah, right," Janeka said. "That's why you have the Scepter of Unbending Time at your side and have no idea why you might have a grandson you don't recognize. Pull the other one, ginger-top. Damn fucker." Her Blaze of Battle was a comforting feeling in her hand, longsword and heavy gun all in one.

Loki smirked at that. "Oh, how astute you are. Almost observant even. So much better than the Aesir. Odin's brat is obnoxiously blind at times. I've been tempted to title him Nod the Second."

Sheila frowned as she realized Loki was holding his other hand oddly. Did he have a relic weapon that he was planning on using? With but a flicker of her will, she sent out a thought to

"So who are you brats, pretending to be gods?" the trickster god said in an acerbic, biting tone.

"Grandfather, we don't have to pretend." Dolph's features morphed into a terrifying, too handsome appearance. "I am now Djorgen, Prince of Hel."

Loki twirled the scepter and then rubbed it on his other sleeve to buff an invisible imperfection off. "And how about you, little black beauty?"

Janeka was very glad she did not have to worry about blood pressure. "I am Bellicus Decipio, The Artificer Goddess of War."

"And I am Vorathir, the Never Despairing. It has been an age before an age, Loki Quick-Wit and Trip Tongue," the time-lost and ancient Atlantean said in a controlled contrallo.

Loki winced at that. "I thought everyone had forgotten that title. I was a very young god when I had that title. And you should not exist. At all." The Aesir god of trickery actually frowned at that. The Atlanteans were no more, all banished for eternity.

"I'm Tsukyo-Ryo, the Dancing Tsunami! The Way of Tsukyo! Don't you forget it or wear it out!" The young Amatsukami preened at everyone staring at him for a second, somehow pulling of the affable and funny comment with poise.

"I am Venatorfuriae , Goddess of the Furies." Dana was more shadow than physical being, a nimbus of light barely highlighting her in a corona of moonlight that gave a palpable feeling of dread.

"Shelinaria, Goddess of Battle and Excellence," the last and youngest goddess said carefully.

"So is this where you explain that you have sworn your undying hatred of me and mine? Or is this where you explain that you are just here to prove you a trickier and more cunning?" Loki's tone was bored.

"We're just here for the shiny stick, carrot-top. I can just imagine the stupid tricks you would get up to if you can travel in time," Bellicus said, a loopy smile on her obsidian features.

"Like kidnapping a future-past you?" the trickster said as he released his glamors from the younger Janeka. "Oops. I did that already."

"What sort of shit is this?" the younger and much higher pitched Janeka said. "That can't be me down there. She's too pretty." She was still trying to struggle and escape.

"Shit. Damn. Fuck." Bellicus Decpitico was staring aghast at her past self.

"Loki! Don't you dare harm a hair on her head," Djorgen roared out. "Otherwise I will find you and rip you limb from limb. That I swear."

"I'm in the position of strength, grandchild of the future. You have nothing that I care for," the redhead said with a nasty smirk. "You shouldn't swear impossible oaths."

Djorgen schooled his face, carefully letting slip just a hint of worry. "That's not true. I have something you would kill for. I can also swear that this is true."

The ancient god blinked at that. He was the Aesir god of lies, so he was fairly good at picking up truths and falsehood. "What?" This boy was not lying.

"You give me Janeka and I'll return what's yours to you," the much younger Aesir said in a hard tone. "It concerns your Fate."

That got Loki's attention. "Tell me what you have, youngling," he snarled out. The mystical connection to the Devourer of Fire within him raised the temperature in the room ten degrees even as he gripped the child's arm, bruising her grip.

"No, we do a trade," Djorgen demanded. The blond haired Aesir god glared his grandfather down.

"You... are a true son of Hel. I look forward to getting to know you better," Loki said as he suddenly smiled. "Come forward, Son of Hel."

They met in the middle of the spinning pumps and centrifuges. The young Janeka was staring at the terrifying Adonis of male perfection.

Djorgen reached out with his free hand, the other hidden behind his back.

Loki pulled her away. "Not quite so quick. My item of fate."

The younger god pulled out the frozen spike of flame tried to slam it into Loki's chest. The older and far more canny god had expected something like that, but nearly froze in shock at the sight of his Doom. Fires washed over his skin, hotter than a bonfire even as he fled his physical form. Nothing physical could affect him here.

Then he started to laugh, filling the room with his etheric presence. "Safe! You can't harm me now!" Loki howled.

The tink of Athena's Scepter hitting the cracked concrete was lost amid the screaming form of the child Janeka. Her burning form glowed from within even as her form crumbled to the ground as ashes.

Tick.

Shelinaria, Venatorfuriae and Bellicus Decpitico had charged forward, flickering so fast it was hard to see them as they each caught the scepter before it bounced a second time.

Tick.

"No! NO! NOO!" Djorgen shouted, his visage turning so horrific that it almost looked like it could kill. Flames had filled the room as Loki's godly, unbound and immaterial form lashed out. Djorgen leaped forward as if to stab him in vain with the piece of iced over fire.

TICK.

"Fool-!?" Loki started to say.

TICK.

The younger Aesir gripped hard on the _Doom_, focusing all of his might upon breaking something that was beyond mortal understanding of material strength. Snap.

TICK.

The frozen flame of Loki's Fate in Ragnarok flashed brighter than the trickster god's fire, returning home in a blink. "NOOOOooooo!" he screamed in terror. He had spent millenium avoiding his fate! Centuries of work that he would have to redo before Ragnarok! "DIE!"

His immaterial form shifted into the Devourer, avatar of the all consuming, primordial, cosmic fire. The power of a full fledged, unlimited god blasted through the roof of the building to tower over the shocked city of Marsbug. The whole city seemed to be engulfed in a sea of flames as Loki roared his anger into the heavens, unknowningingly guiding bombers to attack.

CRACK!

And Paradox shattered the shadow of reality, sweeping the young gods away into time. A strong hand gripped Shelinaria's shoulder, pulling her away to meet a major step on her destiny.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 21: Secrets<strong>

Shelinaria spun out of the impossibly colored shadows and into the dry, powdery snow on top of the unforgiving shadowy ice. Before she had gone ten feet she was back on feet to skid to a perfect halt.

"Sheila Henderson, it is time," Vorathir said as she materialized, stepping from somewhere else.

"If you demand people call you by your proper godly name, then you should do the courtesy of the same," the much, much younger girl said angrily.

"Yet that is the problem, for you are still on the knife edge of Apotheosis. And I know of only one person that I may seek that can untangle your dangerously unstable existence." The statuesque Atlantean goddess walked down the hallway, unconcerned with the bitter sub-zero cold and near nudity.

"What did that mirror do, Vorathir?" Sheila asked suspiciously as she trotted behind the taller woman.

"I am not sure, which is why I am here," the Never Despairing goddess said. She raised her left hand up to point at a thick, warped and jagged sheet of black ice in the dark. It was blasted back as if hit by a howitzer, revealing the dark amphitheatre of the prison of Demosia. She chanted another spell and then slowly floated off the ground.

The terraces down below that fell into the pit, deeper and deeper, were ignored as Vorathir floated up to the giant figure hanging from chains at the top of the dome. Each chain was scribed with words and symbols of powers from all of the Pantheons, binding the traitor goddess as she hung from the capstone.

"Mother." Vorathir's dark brown eyes were hard. She spoke in her native tongue, lost to the depths of time.

Swirling winds brought Shelinaria up to their height, letting her study the one hundred foot tall figure bound in arcane chains. "Demosia, the Atlantean Goddess of Mystery, Magic and the Moon."

One eye opened, revealing a cold blue light. "My daughter. Stolen, lost. Returned to free our people." The voice reverberated with power, even at just a whisper.

Vorathir frowned. "Who were bound because they turned traitor. Was your lust of forbidden magic and power so strong?"

"The Prophecies stated that Atlantis would be destroyed..." the raspy voice answered.

"So you betrayed the Compact with the other gods, which led to your destruction. A classical predestination paradox," the youngest, blonde goddess noted aloud.

Demosia started to laugh. "Yes, it makes so much sense in hindsight. Just like your mistakes, little godling. I see your need in my blindness. A moment of mistaken heroism has damaged you."

"The Mirror of Alnottis... The Mirror of Elsewhere. It injured Sheila's spirit when it broke," her daughter replied.

"It hangs unbroken... from my feet as a chain upon reality and to bind the other gods in their prisons." Both of Demosia's glowing blue eyes opened and stared down at Sheila. "You are time-lost. From the future." A smile could be just barely see under the chains wrapped over her head. "It seems that others break the Compact."

"Yes, because gods are so good at following orders they disagree with," Shelinaria said in a droll tone. She was sitting casually on a gust of air in front of the titan avatar.

"I think I like you, little girl. You tread down a dark path, unflinching."

"Mother, it is time to speak of what can be done to repair her damaged spirit. She was quite close to the Mirror of Alnottis-"

"Why should I care for a whore of Olympus?" Demosia spat out angrily, shaking the huge, frozen room and causing shards of ice to fall from the ceiling.

"Hey!"

"She is not to blame for your fall! Your failure is what has destroyed our pantheon and people!" Vorathir shouted back.

"What do I care? We have been tied here to the cold which is so alien to our people, locked in darkness until the end of time!" Demosia shouted to the roof as the sigils carved in her chains started to glow in power, containing her power and keeping her from escaping.

"That is unfair," Shelinaria agreed in a loud, clear voice.

Demosia was gnashing her teeth. "Do you think it funny? To make light of my suffering?"

"No, I meant exactly what I said. It is unfair. In the modern, mortal world, there are very few sentences that are 'until death'. Even Zeus has stated that Sisyphus can be free if he rolls a boulder to the top of his mountain. There is no option for parole or release for good behavior," the very young goddess state. "Of course, someone that was freed would have to prove that they would not hold a grudge and try to imprison their enemies in retaliation."

"How naive," Demosia said angrily.

"Possibly," the youngest goddess admitted to the titan avatar of darkness.

"Free me and I will tell you how to recover the fragments of your soul!" Demosia shouted out in a voice that seemed to fill the whole chamber and actually knocked the two newly ascended goddesses back five feet.

"No. I won't just free you. I might see to having you freed, because unless you are so dangerous that you threaten all existence or are totally unreasonable that you will immediately attack the other gods, no one should be locked up for all eternity," the young girl declared as she stared at the giant behemoth of a titan hanging from the magical capstone of the dome.

"Fool! You will never fulfill your potential. You will languish forever on the cusp of divinity!" Demosia shouted, shaking the amphitheater cavern of ice.

"I just have to find my shards wherever they are and recover them. It sounds... challenging."

"You would travel the shadow realities? Infinities beyond your comprehension?" The bound titan was seething as she saw her opportunity disappearing.

Shelinaria raised her left hand where she wore the Ring of Fleeting Health, stolen from the corpse of her traitor cousin after he tried to murder her. "I just may happen to have the perfect tool to go anywhere."

Vorathir frowned at the girl. "You would be traveling all alone, into the truly unknown." She floated over closer to the young girl, putting her hand on her shoulder. "Are you sure?"

"I have to succeed. Every one of us could be critical to stopping the titans," Shelinaria said simply. The simple gold band belied its power. She grabbed her tattered essence, releasing her limited mortal form.

Glowing red lines, her ugly wounds from the Mirror of Alnottis, formed across her skin, making her look like she was made of cracked crystal and crimson light. Herme's power over being able to travel anywhere struggled to find a path. Just a single inch in front of her finger, space bent as it rippled like waters swirling in a vortex.

It spun ponderously clockwise as the youngest goddess of Atlantis floated away slightly to safety, interested in spite of herself. Even if it was not magic, per se, it was mystical and of great power.

The air continued to ripple like water as shadows fluttered amid red flecks of light. Ichor started to seep out of her glowing wounds. With a shout, she forced her hand forward into the vortex of shadowy ripples to make the ring to take her elsewhere

She disappeared with a soundless snap.

The last daughter of Atlantis nodded and started to float off towards the exit.

A lone drop of ichor fluttered down in the freezing cold, freezing and it rippled down. It miss touching one of the arcane marked chains by the merest hairwidths. The arcane sigils tried to draw upon the touch of godliness, sapping it of vitality.

The ripples turned into crinkles of feathering crystals as the liquid transformed into a perfect snowflake, overflowing with every color and darkness.

Demosia kept her inhuman intellect focused on the strange happening as the single snowflake or godly blood fluttered down her chained and bound body. The chains and their power dampening runes kept trying to absorb the foreign and unknown power.

It kept being pulled back towards the chains and their glyphs of power until finally settled on cold, frozen metal. The Mirror of Alnottis laid silent with the single snowflake for the longest moment.

And then it made a tiny, infinitesimal tinkle of breaking red glass.

The bound, traitor goddess Demosia opened her glowing blue eyes ever so slightly.

And smiled.

* * *

><p>And this ends the first 'book' of Sheila Henderson. Her adventures will continue in 'Goddess of Excellence'.<p>

**Coming Soon.**


	8. Continuation - Goddess of Excellence

Look for the continuation of Scion of Athena with my new story "Goddess of Excellence".

Story ID number - 10240021


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